Ordering a local taxi whether you’re visiting India, China, Southeast Asia or the US is about to get a whole lot easier as the partnership designed to kill Uber has just launched in beta.
Starting this week, Chinese Didi users will now be able to use their regular app when ordering a cab in the US, thanks to a backend deal with Lyft, and it’ll still let you pay using your regular account, in the currency you’d usually pay.
Soon, you’ll be able to fire up your favorite taxi app – whether it’s Lyft, Didi, Grab or Ola – across any of the markets they serve and behind the scenes it’ll hook you up with its local partner.
According to Forbes, the next stage is ensuring this will work for US travellers heading to China, indicating that the seamless set up the company might have hoped for is proving harder than first thought.
When the deal was first announced a few months ago, we noted that the combined reach of these four companies is nearly half the world’s population.
Often they have a better local presence than Uber, which has simply taken its brand and dumped it in many new markets.
These local services have also typically been tailored better to local needs, with a company like Grab offering cash payments across the countries it serves in Southeast Asia, prompting Uber to update its service just last week.
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