There are big business opportunities lying in store for leading taxi aggregators like Meru Cabs, Uber and Ola.

While the Delhi Government readies to cut down private car numbers on roads to approximately half for tackling pollution and congestion, taxi aggregators like Meru Cabs, Ola and Uber are currently considering the best measures to take advantage of the hidden opportunities in this case. The Delhi Government is also planning to have auto rickshaws and buses in greater numbers on roads throughout the duration of this rule while Delhi Metro capacity will also be scaled up significantly.

Uber may be launching car pooling services for commercial and private vehicles in Delhi. UberPool only covers commercial vehicles in Bangalore but the services in Delhi will be targeting approximately 28 lakh owners of private cars before the odd-even plan kicks off. Meru will be launching its mobile app in January for car pooling and this will identify two people within a two-three kilometer radius who are going in the same direction and taxi rides can be shared according to Meru CEO, Siddhartha Pahwa. The driver will be picking up the first individual and then the next rider will be picked up within 10 minutes under this system.

Ola has recently launched minibus shuttle services in Noida and Gurgaon and this could also cover Delhi. The taxi sharing app is currently being tested in Bangalore and could also be introduced for the NCR. Ola Share is used by customers in Bangalore at INR 50 for multiple rides as an introductory ride. Ola has 60, 000 vehicles in its database for Delhi and 16, 000 of the same are auto rickshaws.

Meru will be giving an incentive for sharing rides to the tune of 35% discounts. In case of unavailability of an individual for ride sharing, the discount will still be given to a customer. Ola is also looking at CNG adoption, shuttle, autos, cabs and the lowest ETAs in the state. Carzonrent, the rental company, will be delivering cars from the self-drive Myles-Cars unit to homes of customers while Easycabs, its taxi division, will promote ride sharing.

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