Complicated, Google and Uber Head to Head in Carpooling Now
Complicated, Google and Uber Head to Head in Carpooling Now
A
A
A
SAN FRANCISCO - Uber and Google have a complicated relationship now. Google Ventures invested $250 million in Uber three years ago, and you can book an Uber ride through the Google Maps app on your phone.
But the two companies have bigger and bigger ambitions—they both want to experiment in the delivery market, and they will both likely deliver self-driving cars to market one day.
Last year, former Googler Rachel Whetstone was hired as Uber’s S.V.P. of policy and communication, replacing David Plouffe, and she took with her a whole group of Google employees to reboot Uber’s communications team. Tom Fallows, who founded Google Express and is a current executive at Uber, said onstage last year that one of every three people he works with at Uber is a former Google employee.
Into this complex relationship comes a new development: Google parent company Alphabet has revealed a plan to let Waze users carpool in the Bay Area. (Google purchased Waze for $1.3 billion in 2013.)
The Wall Street Journal reports the pilot program will let Bay Area employees use Waze to get rides to and from work for 54 cents per mile. It’s open to 25,000 employees of companies like Adobe and Walmart in the Bay Area, who can hitch a ride through Waze’s Waze Rider app and pay the driver through the app.
Waze is typically used as a navigation app, but carpooling will ostensibly let it compete directly with Uber and Lyft, which both have their own carpooling services. Alphabet says in the coming weeks it will offer its 700,000 Waze users in the Bay Area the chance to drive for the service. Unlike Uber and Lyft, which both do basic background checks on drivers, Alphabet has said it doesn’t have plans to screen its Waze drivers.
During its pilot test in the Bay Area, Alphabet won’t take a cut of the commission from rides. In Tel Aviv, where Alphabet began testing Waze’s carpool functionality last summer, it takes a 15 percent commission on every ride.
When Waze launched its carpooling feature last year in Israel, it insisted it wasn’t an Uber competitor: unlike Uber, which has drivers who make a living on the platform, Waze said, it was simply connecting people who needed a ride.
Waze drivers are limited to two rides per day—to and from work—and they only get paired with one other rider who shares a similar commute, while Uber drivers can pick up as many rides as they want, regardless of where their passengers are going.
Still, it’s hard not to draw parallels between the two companies’ carpooling offerings. With Google and Uber both racing to get a foothold in the emerging self-driving car market, the competition is just beginning.
But the two companies have bigger and bigger ambitions—they both want to experiment in the delivery market, and they will both likely deliver self-driving cars to market one day.
Last year, former Googler Rachel Whetstone was hired as Uber’s S.V.P. of policy and communication, replacing David Plouffe, and she took with her a whole group of Google employees to reboot Uber’s communications team. Tom Fallows, who founded Google Express and is a current executive at Uber, said onstage last year that one of every three people he works with at Uber is a former Google employee.
Into this complex relationship comes a new development: Google parent company Alphabet has revealed a plan to let Waze users carpool in the Bay Area. (Google purchased Waze for $1.3 billion in 2013.)
The Wall Street Journal reports the pilot program will let Bay Area employees use Waze to get rides to and from work for 54 cents per mile. It’s open to 25,000 employees of companies like Adobe and Walmart in the Bay Area, who can hitch a ride through Waze’s Waze Rider app and pay the driver through the app.
Waze is typically used as a navigation app, but carpooling will ostensibly let it compete directly with Uber and Lyft, which both have their own carpooling services. Alphabet says in the coming weeks it will offer its 700,000 Waze users in the Bay Area the chance to drive for the service. Unlike Uber and Lyft, which both do basic background checks on drivers, Alphabet has said it doesn’t have plans to screen its Waze drivers.
During its pilot test in the Bay Area, Alphabet won’t take a cut of the commission from rides. In Tel Aviv, where Alphabet began testing Waze’s carpool functionality last summer, it takes a 15 percent commission on every ride.
When Waze launched its carpooling feature last year in Israel, it insisted it wasn’t an Uber competitor: unlike Uber, which has drivers who make a living on the platform, Waze said, it was simply connecting people who needed a ride.
Waze drivers are limited to two rides per day—to and from work—and they only get paired with one other rider who shares a similar commute, while Uber drivers can pick up as many rides as they want, regardless of where their passengers are going.
Still, it’s hard not to draw parallels between the two companies’ carpooling offerings. With Google and Uber both racing to get a foothold in the emerging self-driving car market, the competition is just beginning.
(rnz)
Explore More