How to Start an Online Ride-hailing Business like Uber & Grab

Saurabh Thakur
4 min readFeb 3, 2021

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Mobile app technology has changed every business around the world. It provides an easy way to get & deliver the services for both service providers & seekers. It’s easy to use & quick response makes it a hit in the mobility market.

According to Statista, the number of smartphone users worldwide today surpasses 3 billion and is forecast to further grow by several 100 million in the next few years. India, China & the US are the countries that have a higher number of smartphone users.

Businesses like online food delivery & online cab business are completely dependent on the mobile app.

Big players like Uber, Ola, and Grab have made their brand name in this industry and have gained customers’ trust by offering the high quality services.

How to start a ride-hailing business?

Like other businesses, the online taxi market is also facing competition because everyone is trying to prove themselves best by providing quick services to users. So it’s very challenging to beat the competitors.

Business owners must do their research work before entering on the ride-hailing business. Here are a few steps that you need to consider before starting your own business.

1. Market research
2. Launch an app
3. Invest in marketing

  1. Market research
    Before entering in this business you need to do some market research. It is the first & important thing that can be considered when planning to invest in a new venture. Market research gives an estimated idea about business needs, popularity in region, competition (what other competitors are doing), etc.

2. Launch an app
App is a must for this type of business. But just a simple app is not sufficient to compete with your competitors. You need a powerful feature-rich mobile app that will help you overcome the competition. To develop a fully loaded taxi booking app you need to hire a taxi app development company that has a strong knowledge in taxi app building.

For the entire taxi booking platform business, you need to launch two mobile apps; driver app and rider/customer app. Both apps require advanced level features.

Driver app:
This app is used by drivers who partner with the company. Here are the few must have features of driver app; driver report, secure admin panel, driver destinations, advanced route building.

Rider app:
This app is used by the customers to book their rides. Geolocation and Routing, ride’s estimated cost, easy login with social media profiles, payment method integration, advanced ride scheduling, etc.

3. Invest in marketing
Marketing is also an important part of success of a business. To reach your target audience you need to spend money in marketing. It will help you to establish your identity & popularity among the customers.

Cost To Build a Mobile App Like Uber?

The app development cost depends on several factors such as the region you have chosen, app features, technology, app platforms (iOS & Android), etc.

Even, the cost can differ between the two companies in the same region based on their experience, and the number of resources, etc. Here are the average per hour rates for different locations around the world.

North America — $60–250 per hour

United Kingdom — $60–150 per hour

Western Europe — $40–120 per hour

Eastern Europe — $20–100 per hour

India — $10–80 per hour

I would suggest you choose a region or country which charges less per hour rates but along with that, you don’t need to compromise with the quality of services.

Conclusion

The online cab booking or ride hailing business is a profitable & future oriented business. And, there are still plenty of options for new players to establish themselves. You need to consider a skilled & professional app development company like FATbit Technologies to build the feature-rich taxi mobile app for your ride-hailing business.

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Saurabh Thakur
Saurabh Thakur

Written by Saurabh Thakur

Marketing analyst and an amateur writer

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