Ridehailing – Africa Tech Digest

12Jun

By Africa Tech DigestNo Comments

Ridehailing

Uber to remove riders with bad feedback

Uber has announced a new quality system to remove riders with persistently bad feedback. Soon Uber will begin notifying a small number of riders who have consistently received bad feedback from drivers, that they must improve their behaviour or they could lose access to the Uber app. With this new policy, when Uber sees a pattern of riders getting consistently bad feedback, they will receive a warning and will be given advice on how to improve, if they continue to receive bad feedback from drivers after warnings, the next step would be to temporarily suspend their account for one week and if still there is no improvement eventually face the possibility of full deactivation. Alon Lits, General Manager for Uber Sub-Saharan Africa explains, “We have recently updated our community guidel...

Motorcycles Enter Ride-Hailing App Industry in Nigeria

When a customer scrolls through the options on a ride-hailing app in Lagos, Africa’s largest city, cars are no longer the only things that show up. Over the past 18 months, motorcycle-hailing startups have become players in the city’s tech ecosystem, all competing for traction and market share in a city beset with some of the continent’s worst transportation challenges. By itself, the idea of an on-demand, flexible transport service to get around Lagos’ hours-long traffic jams and congestion is an appealing proposition for millions of Lagosians. It’s also cheaper compared with established car-hailing services like Uber and Taxify. To be clear, commercial transport motorcycles, known locally as okadas have long existed in Lagos, like in many other African cities where they h...

Volkswagen Expansion in Africa With Ride-Hailing App Gains Traction

It’s been a year since one of the world’s biggest automotive companies, Volkswagen, bet on tiny and landlocked Rwanda as part of its expansion strategy in Africa. Since the 1950s, the German automaker has assembled cars in South Africa, and later in Nigeria and Kenya. The carmaker’s renewed interest in Africa is driven by the demand for brand new cars propelled by an emerging middle class as well as competition from companies like Toyota, Nissan, and Peugeot who are ramping up production in the continent. In Rwanda, Volkswagen set up a $20 million operation expected to produce up to 5,000 vehicles a year and create about 1,000 jobs. In Kigali, VW also placed a wager on another first for its global operations: ride-hailing services. The project is part of an initiative to use Rwanda t...