According to reports, the ride-hailing app Namma Yatri, based in Bengaluru, is looking into entering the American market.
An article in a well-known media outlet states that the firm is negotiating with various US unions in an effort to distinguish itself from industry heavyweights like Lyft and Uber.
In addition, the article stated that the company’s entry into the US market will be backed by Juspay, which separated Namma Yatri into its own entity in April of this year.
Juspay has recently stated its intentions to expand into international markets, including the United States, and received a payment aggregator license from the Reserve Bank of India.
Obstacles in the Western Market
Because the taxi industry is a very low-margin business, it is a free market in the USA, and anyone who has a superior product can enter it. The question is, however, whether they will be able to maintain it because of the circumstances. Not only that, but Uber and Lyft are the two companies that dominate the market in the United States. When compared to the situation in India, the drivers in the United States are in the same position.
It is impossible for businesses to enter a new market without first lowering their prices, and if the prices are lowered, the driver will not obtain any profit from the transaction. In order to attract investors, businesses that invest a significant amount of capital in a market must also guarantee a certain rate of return on their investment. Namma Yatri will face competition from companies such as Uber, Didi, Grab, and Lyft if it decides to enter the market in the United States. On the other hand, at a time when there is some unhappiness among drivers and customers, the Indian company will be able to gain an advantage and take off thanks to the relationship with unions.
The Indian Market Continues to Be the Primary Focus at Present
Namma Yatri’s primary focus continues to be on increasing its reach within India, even if discussions and negotiations on expansion in the United States are still underway.
Karnataka (Bengaluru, Mysuru, and Tumakuru), Kerala (Kochi), West Bengal (Kolkata, Asansol-Durgapur, and Siliguri), Telangana (Hyderabad), Tamil Nadu (Chennai), and Delhi are the states in which it is currently actively operating.
Blume Ventures and Antler led the pre-Series A funding round, which raised $11 million (approximately INR 91 crore) a month ago. Sundar Pichai-led tech behemoth Google and other investors also participated. This development comes right one month after the company acquired the aforementioned funding, indicating Namma Yatri’s future growth plans.
Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified information on different startups and organizations. The content in this post has been approved by Lyft.
The urging need for a better and safer travel system is fulfilled by Lyft. Lyft has become a household name from the time it was launched in 2012. Lyft is highly considered by the citizens of the United States and Canada for booking their rides.
Lyft was launched in 2012 by Logan Green and John Zimmer as the second-largest ride-sharing company in the United States. From the time of its launch up till now, it is known to provide multiple facilities such as providing a ride, arranging the driver, delivering food, etc.
Lyft has its roots expanded and well-developed in its field. Let us have a look at other important details such as founders, back story, mission and vision, business models, etc.
Let’s go through the Lyft success story and know about Lyft, its founders, business model, revenue model, funding, startup story, competitors and more.
Mobile Apps, Ride Sharing, Software, Transportation
Area Served
United States, Canada
Revenue
$3.2 billion (2021)
Total Funding
$4.9 billion (2022)
Website
www.lyft.com
Lyft – About
Lyft is an American-based mobility provider providing service that is considered the second-largest trusted ridesharing service in the United States. Lyft provides an application of its own that works in favour of people to help them with their travel plans. Apart from managing their travel, it also offers other services such as food delivery, ride-sharing, and renting bicycles types of services.
Lyft uses 58+ technology products and services in its application and website. This enables the easy and updated use of its technology. Lyft is not a cab hiring service, instead, it connects the user with the facility provider to earn profit.
Lyft – Industry
The mobile application industry is the fastest growing industry due to the increased number of users. Along with mobile applications, the usage of personalized software makes it much more compatible to be used by any startup. In recent years, the software industry along with the mobile application industry has been combined to give out better results and eliminate the restricted use of models due to medium.
The ridesharing industry is the new talk of the town as the assumption to be believed is that the global ride-sharing market is projected to grow with a 16.6% CAGR with an estimated USD of 85.8 billion in 2021 to be around 185.1 billion by 2026 as per the report published by marketsandmarkets.com.
The transportation industry deals with the economy and the movements of people from one place to another. Lyft works together in this industry to provide relevant services with a profitable business.
Lyft – Founders and Team
Logan Green
Logan Green, CEO and Co-founder of Lyft
Logan Green, highly recognized as the CEO and co-founder of Lyft, was born in Los Angeles in 1983. Green is recorded to complete his schooling at New Roads High School, California. For his higher education, Green attended the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB). He completed his bachelor’s in 2006 and is recorded to hold a degree of Bachelor of Arts in Business Economics.
During his education, Green had achieved and served a few great responsibilities. Green had created the Green Initiative Fund while still being a student. He also served as a board member for Isla Vista Recreation and Park District in his early life.
Before the launch of Lyft, there was another carpooling service founded by Green and his friend John Zimmer named Zimride in the year 2007. After the success of Zimride, Green was not yet satisfied with his work and went forward to embrace the risk with the launch of Lyft in 2012.
John Zimmer
John Zimmer, Co-founder and President of Lyft
John Zimmer is a co-founder and president of Lyft born in 1984. He completed his education at Cornell University School of Hotel Administration. He was known to be a member of Sigma Pi Fraternity during his college years.
After completing his education, Zimmer went on to work as an analyst for real estate finance at Lehman Brothers (New York City).
While working for the Lehman Brothers, Zimmer along with his dearest friend Logan Green went on to launch a ridesharing platform named Zimride. After some time, Zimmer left his job at Lehman Brothers and again went on to give rise to another ridesharing platform named Lyft with the equal contribution from Logan Green.
Lyft – Startup Story
Initially, Lyft was started just as a part of Zimride. The story behind it becoming the sole project of John Zimmer and Logan Green is quite interesting to look at. Lyft is not any on-road ridesharing enabling platform, instead, it is the second most used ridesharing service in the United States.
To know the exact reason behind Lyft, one must be aware of the story of Zimride. As for the start, Lyft was a part of Zimride only before selling it to a private company.
The founders of Lyft met each other through a common friend and got to know each other on Facebook.
Logan Green used to travel to Los Angeles to meet his girlfriend. Green used to make sharing rides for travelling the distance. However, the key point in their travelling was mostly his anxiety about unknown drivers and passengers.
On the other hand, John Zimmer used to own a car but didn’t have any possible rider to share his ride with. He noticed that 80% of seats are empty on American Highways.
Both the friends put up their thoughts together and created the carpooling service named Zimride in 2007. The logic behind naming Zimride was taken from Zimbabwe, where they encountered people sharing rides as their basic transportation.
Zimride was created by keeping college students in mind. It was created in a way to provide easy travel access to the campus carpooling. They also provided a good way for students to earn money through Zimride. Till the year 2012, Zimride had thousands of users with 150+ universities participating in the business. Even after the great achievement, the co-founders were left with some dissatisfaction in their minds.
To improve the business and provide more easy ways to the users, Logan Green and John Zimmer gave rise to Lyft.
“Lyft came out of a hackathon project where we were trying to figure out what does Zimride look like on mobile.” – Logan Green.
With the concept in mind, they built and launched the Lyft application in the year 2012. Soon after the launch of Lyft, it started raising enough funds for its development. Lyft also proved as a healthy competitor to already existing ride-sharing company Uber.
With the constant expansion of Lyft, the co-founders of Lyft concluded renaming Zimride “Lyft” in 2013. Along with that, they sold the Zimride services to Enterprise Holdings.
From there on, Lyft has successfully tried to accomplish its goal and is still on its way to success even after some rough waves.
Lyft – Mission and Vision
The mission stated by Lyft is to “Improve people’s lives with the world’s best transportation”.
The vision of Lyft is stated as “ride by ride, we are changing the way our world works. We imagine a world where cities feel small again. Where transportation and tech bring people together, instead of apart. We see the future as community-driven and it starts with you.”
Lyft – Name, Tagline, and Logo
Name
Lyft name of the vehicle is the general word “lift” and shares the same meaning. The idea behind naming Lyft ” originated after Logan Green observed people sharing minivan taxis in Zimbabwe. From there, the idea to name their startup Lyft ” originated, However, it was made in use after a few years when Zimride was renamed Lyft.
Tagline
The tagline of Lyft is Your Friend with a car.
The Initial thought of the Lyft founders was to enable safer and secure travelling options for daily commuters. The tagline itself suggests that a customer can trust their rider like a friend and can travel comfortably without worry.
Logo
Lyft Logo
In the first logo of Lyft, The Pink Moustache with the name Lyft was made. However, with time, only the name is left as its logo.
Yet, Lyft vehicles were found to have a big pink moustache attached in the front. The prime reason behind this was the old friend of the founder of Lyft named Ethan Eyler. Ethan Eyler was known to run a company at that time selling big pink moustaches that can be attached to vehicles in the front.
As for the logo of Lyft, all the letters of Lyft are written in small letters with Pink colours on a white background. The reason behind selecting the colour pink was to normalize the Lyft brand as more friendly for females riders. Lyft was originally planned as a fun-filled and friendly ride-sharing option for its users and hence selecting such a vibrant colour gives out a similar vibe to daily commuters.
Lyft is an on-demand ride-hailing platform. It enables the online connection of a ride needing the user to the rider available at the nearby location. The typical business model of Lyft works on the principle of Peer to Peer model.
It combines all the necessary details such as base charge, the distance covered, the per-minute charges, the per-mile cost, time of day, ride type, the chosen route, number of available drivers, current demand for rides, and any extra charges or taxes. With all this calculation, the only remaining part is the time required to reach the destination. After going through all these elements, the final fare is decided.
There are four basic steps in the Lyft Business Model. However, Lyft itself is compromised of two different parts, riders, and drivers.
Riders
The four basic steps for Riders are:
Requesting a Ride
In this step, a rider needs to download the application of Lyft and complete their profile. Once done with the basic process, they can start with the available options and decide according to their needs.
Coordination
This step is mainly done by Lyft. Lyft enables the nearby available Lyft ride as a suggested option as per the rider. Once matched, basic information is shared on both sides such as the live location of the driver with the vehicle information, and the driver’s name is shared with the rider. And the personal needed information about the rider is shared with the driver for their easy access to each other.
Ride
Once the request is accepted by the driver and the ride is accessed by the rider. The actual map of the destination is shared with the driver and real-time tracking is enabled for the safety of the rider.
Final Check With Payment and Ratings
Once the ride is completed, the final amount is displayed to both parties with the option of rating each other. A rider can rate the driver with needy comments and the same facility is given to the driver to rate their rides.
Drivers
Lyft has a slight change to the business models for those wishing to make money through driving but does not have their vehicle. For such people, Lyft has a dedicated Express Drive Program through which one can easily rent a car to drive. Before that, they need to get eligible to bypass the profile screening test. Once all this procedure is done, the driver can then start with their allocated process of four steps:
To Register As A Driver
For this process, Lyft has assigned them another application known as Lyft Driver App. After downloading the application, the driver needs to set up their profile with honest details. Once completed, they can then enable themselves on a Drive Mode to receive notifications from neighbouring locations.
Receiving A Request
After the drive mode is on, the Lyft application allows the nearby passenger’s details to be sent to the driver for the ride. A driver has the option of either accepting or neglecting the ride request based on their judgments.
Completing A Ride
When a ride is accepted by the driver, basic details are shared on both the sides by Lyft Application. Along with that real-time tracking is enabled for higher safety. Once the ride is completed, the Lyft application automatically calculates the payment based on multiple factors and displays them on the screen.
Payment and Ratings
A rider needs to pay up a shown amount to the driver. Once the whole process is complete, a driver can rate their riders on a scale of 1 to 5.
Lyft – Revenue Model
Lyft gets its revenue mostly from the bookings made through it. Bookings stand for the completed rides done through Lyft Application. Lyft takes a commission from each of those rides. 80% of each completed ride goes to its driver whereas 20% is taken by Lyft.
In the year 2020, Lyft earned its revenue of approximately $2.3 billion.
Lyft generates its revenue from multiple sources.
Commission From Bookings
This is the majorly constituting source of revenue. As explained above, Lyft cutes 20% of the total payment made by riders after completion of their rides as its commission.
Supply And Demand-Based Fare
Lyft has its prices hiked at certain periods of the day. This is done at the time of traffic, high demand for rides, and similar situations. In this model, Lyft hikes its price temporarily and earns extra profit through each ride.
Availing Subscription Plan
The subscription program of Lyft is called Lyft Pink for riders. Lyft allows its users with the subscription plan of paying $19.99 per month or $199 per year to avail of various benefits such as 15% off on rides, a few additional discounts, and many others. This model also earns Lyft a good source of revenue.
Multimodal Business Plan
Lyft is not confined to a single ride-sharing platform, it has a few different similar services on hand too. Lyft is an on-demand ride-sharing platform giving out four different options for rides. They have scooters and bikes, public transportation, ridesharing service, and a self-driving facility.
Amongst them all, users can easily select their preferred options such as for shorter distances, one can prefer bike and scooter or for some specific reason, one can go with the option of the self-driving vehicle. All this has also contributed to the revenue collected by Lyft.
DOOH
Digital-Out-Of-Door stands for the method of advertisement in a ride. This method is used by Lyft itself also to advertise for the self. Apart from that, Lyft also gives out advertisements to others in exchange for certain fees.
Lyft – Employees
Lyft has its headquarters in San Francisco. Apart from that, it has its offices set up in various locations. The total count of locations is 31 different located offices covering the parts of 6 countries.
As of 2021, Lyft was calculated to be having 4369 employees working for it.
Lyft provides its employees with several facilities as per their job positions. Some of the facilities given by Lyft are Insurance of different types, retirement plans, maternity and paternity leaves, paid holidays, etc.
Some of the key people of Lyft are:
Logan Green- CEO of Lyft
John Zimmer- President Of Lyft
Anthony Fox- Chief Policy Officer, Senior Advisor to President & CEO
Brian Roberts- Chief Financial Officer
Kristin Sverchek- President of Business Affairs
Eisar Lipkovitz- Executive Vice President, Rideshare and Engineering
Lyft has a total of 79 investors and 13 lead investors investing on its platform.
Date
Transaction Name
Money Raised
Lead Investors
Mar 1, 2019
Secondary Market
–
–
Jan 25, 2019
Secondary Market
–
–
Sep 20, 2018
Secondary Market
–
–
Jun 28, 2018
Series I
$600M
Fidelity Management and Research Company
May 4, 2018
Secondary Market
–
–
Mar 16, 2018
Corporate Round
$200M
Magna International
Dec 6, 2017
Series H
$1.1M
–
Dec 5, 2017
Series H
$500M
CapitalG, Rakuten
Oct 19, 2017
Series H
$1B
CapitalG
Sep 15, 2017
Secondary Market
–
–
From the time of its start till now, Lyft has participated in 27 rounds of funding and has received the amount of $4.9 billion. Their latest funding was raised on March 01, 2019.
Lyft – Acquisitions
Lyft has a total of 11 acquisitions with an investment of around $342M.
Kamcord
Leo
Cherry
YesGraph
Halo Cars
Flexdrive
Blue Vision Labs
Motivate
Hitch
DataScore
Lyft – Growth
Lyft was launched three years after Uber. Uber is considered the largest and most trusted ridesharing service in the United States. Earlier, Lyft was started as a ride-sharing company for long distances. But with time, they gave out different options for short distances too.
With this initiation, Lyft came out to be the biggest competitor to Uber. Uber was a well-settled company at that time, yet the growth seen by Lyft in its expansion was commendable. Lyft expanded roughly from 60 cities to 300 cities by the time of 2017.
Another thing that worked in the favour of Lyft was the anti-Uber Campaign in 2017. The campaign allowed Lyft to make its name by eating up Uber’s popularity. The market share earned by Lyft increased from 22% to 33% in the year 2018.
Lyft – Advertisement and Social Media Campaigns
Lyft uses multiple methods to advertise its brand. Lyft is known to take help from social media influencers for its typical advertisement of itself.
Some of the celebrity endorsers of Lyft are LeBron James and Nigel Sylvester. LeBron James is the celebrity influencer used by Lyft for its advertising strategy, whereas Nigel Sylvester is a YouTube content creator, helping them to reach a wider range of users.
Apart from this, Lyft also takes the help from passionate influencers having the ability to reach heights and advertise their platform.
Another common method used by Lyft for its advertisement is in the form of Digital-Out-Of-Home (DOOH). This means advertising a platform within a ride. Lyft also advertises itself by using this method. Lyft also uses Google Ads for socializing its platform.
Each brand keeps on introducing different campaigns to gain the attention of users. The two most successful campaigns launched by Lyft are:
Riding is the new driving.
How to Human.
Riding is the new driving– It was launched in 2016 with a one-minute message showing the traffic drive with a heart vibe.
How to Human campaign was launched in 2019 to normalize the world after a long fight with the COVID pandemic. Even though at that time, the pandemic was not over, few things were coming back to normal. During this campaign, Tinder also teamed up with Lyft for this campaign to avail free rides for the customers as an effort of easing the concept of socializing and dating.
Lyft – Online and Social Media Presence
Lyft has an active Social Media Presence across different platforms. Lyft uses social media platforms as a way of advertising itself. Along with that, it also uses different platforms for announcing new steps.
Social media platform
Followers
Twitter
289.3k
Instagram
180k
Facebook
658k
Lyft – Competitors
Lyft has about 30+ competitors in the market. The top three amongst them are:
Uber Technologies Inc.
Gett.
DiDi.
Uber
Uber is the biggest competitor of Lyft. It was launched in 2009. Uber Technologies Inc. is an American-based mobility service providing company. They serve 72 countries with approximately 10,500 countries. Services given by Uber include, ride-hailing services, food delivery services under the name of Uber eats, package and courier delivery, renting a vehicle, etc. Uber is the leading ride-sharing platform in the United States acquiring about 71% market share of rides sharing as noted in Jan 2022.
Gett
Gett, previously known as GetTaxi, is an Israeli-based transportation provider founded in 2010. Gett mainly focuses on Corporate Ground Transportation Management (CGTM). Areas served by Gett are Israel, Russia, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Europe. Services provided by Gett are corporate fleet, taxi, ride-hailing, and providing limos to their customers as per their request.
DiDi
Didi Chuxing Technology Co. is a Chinese vehicle for hire company launched in 2012. The company deals with application-based transportation services. DiDi provides services to 400+ cities. Common services given by DiDi are Taxi, Express, Premier, Bus, Designated Driving, Enterprise Solutions, Bike Sharing, Car Rental, food delivery, etc.
Lyft – Future Plans
“Now more than ever, we need to work together to create cleaner, healthier, and more equitable communities,” said John Zimmer, co-founder, and president, of Lyft.
Lyft plans to reach 100% electric vehicles on its platform by the time of 2030. This move will help in decreasing the harmful emissions to the environment. Lyft plans to use 100% electric vehicles in 10 years. All the vehicles used on the Lyft platform will be either eligible as electric vehicles or will be reliable to zero-emission technology.
To fulfil this dream, from the year 2017, Lyft was known to work towards the development of electric cars. However, Lyft sold its self-driving unit to Toyota’s unit Woven Planet in 2021.
This step might seem like a hurdle for the future vision of Lyft. But on the better aspects, both the parties are bound in a contract to share data. This allows easy sharing of work between both the companies.
As no developing company would like to work on two aspects together. It is better for Lyft to work towards its main business of ride-sharing and for Woven Planet to work solely on the development part rather than taking interest in the ride-sharing business. With this assumption, we can look forward to having a better and clearer environment through the efforts of Lyft.
Lyft plans to fulfil its dream of establishing 100% autonomous vehicles but with a slight change in the actual plan by mainly focusing on its B2B branch.
Lyft – FAQs
Who is the founder of Lyft?
Logan Green and John Zimmer are the founders of Lyft.
What is Lyft?
Lyft is a ride-hailing service founded by Logan Green and John Zimmer.
Who is the CEO of Lyft?
Logan Green is the current CEO of Lyft.
When was Lyft founded?
Lyft was founded in 2012 by Logan Green and John Zimmer.
Every week, it seems like a new startup wants to be a leader in the autonomous driving sector. Interestingly, most startups that want to lead this industry don’t have an option to buy their technology from companies like Waymo and General Motors. This means that these new startups need to develop the technology themselves. This is why so many startups are entering the autonomous driving market and why the sector is growing so quickly. Quite a few companies are creating autonomous driving technology, and they certainly aren’t all going to survive, though. Instead of trying to persuade you about who the best companies are, We’ve narrowed down our list of the most prominent autonomous driving startups in the US. Here you go!
Headquarters: Mountain View, California, United States
Waymo – Top Autonomous Driving Startups in The US
In the race to develop a self-driving car, it’s hard to talk about autonomous driving startups without mentioning Waymo. Waymo is not a car company. It’s a self-driving technology company. And it’s the most well-funded of all the autonomous vehicle startups out there. The company started life as an independent entity named Google Self-Driving Car Project before becoming a subsidiary of Alphabet, Inc. in December 2016.
Waymo is the undisputed leader in autonomous vehicles, with over 3 million miles driven on public roads and another 5 billion miles driven in computer simulations every year. In 2016, the company introduced its first fully driverless car prototype — a Chrysler Pacifica Hybrid minivan equipped with Waymo’s proprietary sensors and software.
The company maintains that its objective is building a self-driving car that can operate safely, reliably, and successfully. As part of this effort, Waymo has made its software and hardware stack open source and is working with partners such as Jaguar to bring new self-driving cars to market.
Waymo Driverless Car
Cruise
Headquarters: San Francisco, California, United States
Cruise – Top Autonomous Driving Startups in The US
Cruise is one of the most well-known autonomous vehicle startups in the US. The startup has raised nearly $6 billion in funding and is currently valued at almost $20 billion.
The Cruise was founded in 2013 in San Francisco, California, by Daniel Kan and Kyle Vogt. It began as an autonomous vehicle company specializing in self-driving car hardware and software. Still, it evolved into a company that exists to develop autonomous vehicles for mass production and use.
The startup’s mission is “to bring safe, clean, and affordable transportation to everyone, everywhere.” Cruise has developed a self-driving system that can be applied to multiple vehicle platforms to achieve its mission. It also created a Cruise Anywhere app that allows users to summon self-driving cars from their smartphones. GM acquired Cruise Automation in 2016 for over $1 billion.
In 2018, General Motors invested another $2.25 billion into Cruise Automation to increase its equity stake to 75%. In February 2019, Honda announced it would invest $2.75 billion into the startup and take a 5% stake in Cruise Automation.
Zoox
Headquarters: Foster City, California, United States
Zoox – Top Autonomous Driving Startups in The US
This startup is a pioneer in the autonomous vehicles space. It is developing a self-driving ride-hailing service using its driverless electric vehicle. The vehicle doesn’t have a steering wheel or pedals and is designed to carry up to four passengers and travel 75 mph. The company envisions its autonomous driving service as an on-demand mobility solution that provides consumers with safe, low-cost urban transportation around the clock.
Zoox has a different objective from other autonomous driving companies. It’s not just making “an SAE Level 4 self-driving car.” Instead, it is building a fully autonomous, zero-emissions vehicle designed for ride-hailing that seats four passengers in a way that makes them face each other.
Unlike traditional self-driving cars, Zoox’s vehicle is bi-directional. As a result, it can drive forward and backwards in the same direction, enabling it to do more efficient U-turns.
Zoox was founded by Tim Kentley-Klay and Jesse Levinson in 2014 and has raised $290 million from investors including DFJ, Lux Capital, Greylock Partners, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, and Blackbird Ventures.
May Mobility – Top Autonomous Driving Startups in The US
One of the first movers in autonomous vehicles for public transportation, May Mobility is a startup already operating a fleet of driverless shuttles in downtown Detroit. The company’s primary focus is “first- and last-mile” transport — connecting people who live or work on the outskirts of a city with public transit hubs like train stations or bus stops.
The company first raised seed capital in 2017 and has since raised an additional $11.55 million — including a Series A round led by BMW Ventures in 2018 and a follow-on round led by Toyota AI Ventures and Maven Ventures in 2019.
May Mobility launched its first commercial service this summer, carrying passengers between two parking lots at the University of Michigan’s Mcity facility for autonomous vehicle testing. In addition, it partnered with the Detroit Department of Transportation to launch a shuttle service that moves commuters from the city’s QLINE rail line to their nearby offices each morning.
Aurora
Headquarters: Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States
Aurora – Top Autonomous Driving Startups in The US
Aurora is the only company on this list that’s not actively pursuing a product. Instead, it’s building the tools used to build self-driving cars. Aurora aims to create an open platform for self-driving tech, which it will license to other companies. That means Aurora isn’t aiming to compete with any of the companies on this list. Instead, its goal is to help them all succeed in their efforts.
Aurora is on a mission is to deliver the benefits of self-driving technology safely, quickly, and broadly. Self-driving technology could save hundreds of thousands of lives and remake cities.
Their safe and pragmatic approach is to build self-driving technology that will move people and goods worldwide one day. They bring together an incredible team with diverse backgrounds and experiences with a singular objective – to deliver on the promise of self-driving technology.
Aurora is working with several partners, including VW Group and Hyundai, and ride-hailing companies like Lyft and Uber. The company’s biggest claim to fame came in 2019 when it acquired Uber’s ATG division in a deal worth $4 billion.
Aurora has raised more than $1 billion in funding from investors like Sequoia Capital and Greylock Partners.
Nuro
Headquarters: Mountain View, California, United States
Nuro – Top Autonomous Driving Startups in The US
Nuro is one of the most prominent autonomous driving startups in the US. The startup was founded by two former Google engineers, Dave Ferguson and Jiajun Zhu, in 2016. In June 2018, the company was granted a permit to test self-driving vehicles on California’s public roads in June 2018.
Nuro aims to build a self-driving vehicle that can help people with their daily tasks. Unlike most other autonomous driving startups, Nuro doesn’t aim to revolutionize personal mobility; instead, it tries to enhance the efficiency of delivery services. The company demonstrated its prototype in 2017, which didn’t have a driver’s cabin as any human operator would have limited the vehicle’s potential.
Nuro’s mission is to make local commerce more convenient for everyone through the instant delivery of goods and groceries.
Lyft
Headquarters: San Francisco, California, United States
Lyft – Top Autonomous Driving Startups in The US
Lyft is perhaps the most aggressive startup in autonomous driving technology.
The company put down a $300 million investment in the self-driving car startup Drive.ai to put the startup’s technology in Lyft cars by 2022. The two companies expect to launch test programs over the next three years as they work to integrate the technology into Lyft’s fleet.
Lyft also partnered with Waymo, Alphabet’s subsidiary developing self-driving cars, back in 2017 and has been allowing Waymo’s autonomous vehicles on its ride-hailing platform since then.
Lyft’s objective is to build an open-source autonomous driving system that will allow any car manufacturer to integrate it into their vehicles for free. To achieve this goal, Lyft has been working on gathering the necessary data and building a high-definition map that will help self-driving cars understand the roads they travel on.”
The company said it extends the program across more cities and even allows riders to hail vehicles without a safety driver.
Autonomous driving tech will be advancing rapidly over the next few years. These companies are among the leaders in this field.
There are a lot of companies poised to do something big in the world of autonomous driving. As with any major technological trend, it’s important to keep a close eye on the companies in this space. As they grow, they could emerge as some of the most powerful players in the massive field of autonomous driving. The next decade will likely see many of them launch exciting new products and services and maybe even be acquired by some big tech giants. Don’t be surprised if Apple or Google snaps up one or more of these companies, although there’s no reason to believe that they won’t continue growing on their own just as well. In any case, it’s important to keep your eye on these startups to see how they’re faring in years to come.
FAQs
Which are the top autonomous driving startups in the US?
Most prominent autonomous driving startups in the US are:
Cruise
Zoox
May Mobility
Aurora
Nuro
Waymo
Lyft
Which company is leading autonomous driving?
Top companies that develop AI for self-driving cars are:
Cruise
Waymo
Agro.ai.
Is self-driving market growing?
According to researched data, the self-driving market is projected to grow from $54.23 billion to approximately $555.67 billion in 7 years.
What company makes chips for self-driving vehicles?
Companies that make chips for self-driving vehicles are:
On September 3rd 2021, both Lyft and Uber announced that the companies will now cover the complete legal fees of the drivers who get sued under the new controversial abortion law in Texas. The Texas Abortion Law is also known as the Texas Heartbeat Act and Senate Bill 8 was passed on 19th May 2021 bans abortion after six weeks or after the heartbeat is detected.
According to many medical studies, most women usually are not even aware of the pregnancy for six weeks. Besides that Senate Bill 8 also gives Texan citizens the access to file a lawsuit and collect damages of up to $10,000 against anyone who is considered to be aiding or abetting women in getting an abortion. The driver who would drive women to clinics or hospitals in the state is also potentially liable.
The law has caused protests and outrage by women not only in Texas but across the world. It is also considered to be the biggest restraint to the constitutional right of women to get an abortion in decades.
On 3rd September 2021, Logan Green the current CEO of Lyft said that the company is creating a driver legal defense fund in order to cover the complete legal fees if the company driver gets sued under the new abortion law in Texas.
In a statement against the new Senate Bill 8 law, Lyft went on to say that it was incompatible with women basic right to privacy as those are the values of the company.
The company also said that that the law was an attack on women’s access to healthcare and their right. This is why Lyft donated a sum of $1 million to an organization called Planned Parenthood in order to ensure that transportation never becomes a barrier to people accessing healthcare. Lyft also encouraged other companies to follow in their footsteps.
In a statement, Lyft said that “Drivers are never responsible for monitoring where their riders go or why. Imagine being a driver and not knowing if you are breaking the law by giving someone a ride.” The company also added that “Similarly, riders never have to justify, or even share, where they are going and why. Imagine being a pregnant woman trying to get to a healthcare appointment and not knowing if your driver will cancel on you for fear of breaking a law. Both are completely unacceptable.”
Shortly after Lyft statement, Uber’s CEO Dara Khosrowshahi also joined hands with Lyft facilitating their drivers with a similar policy.
In a Twitter post, Dara Khosrowshahi said that “Drivers shouldn’t be put at risk for getting people where they want to go. Team Uber is in too and will cover legal fees in the same way.”
On 19th May 2021, Texas Governor Greg Abbott signed the Texas Heartbeat Act which is also known as Senate Bill 8 of the 87th Legislature. According to this bill, abortion is considered to be outlawed once the heartbeat of a fetal is detected, which usually occurs in the sixth week of pregnancy. Besides banning abortion after six weeks, the law does not have any exceptions for instances of rape or incest.
It only allows abortions in the case of medical emergencies. With Senate Bill 8 coming into action, people can now sue anyone who helps a Texan woman seeking an abortion. However, according to the law, the women seeking an abortion will not be the target of prosecution, while anyone who helps women get abortions can get charged over $10,000 by Texan citizens.
The Senate Bill 8 met with a few legal challenges, but after the Supreme Court denied an emergency appeal from abortion providers the same week. Unfortunately, the Supreme Court voted 5-4 leading to the law to come into action on 1st September 2021.
The top dating companies like Bumble and Match have also raised their voice against the new abortion laws in Texas. The companies have come forth in order to help fund Texan women access the services for abortion. Shar Dubey the CEO of Match said that the company has set up funds for employees who need help to travel to another state to have an abortion.
In a statement, Bumble also added that the company will launch a fund in order to help women who want services for abortion in Texas. Another web hosting company called GoDaddy also removed a group known as Texas Right to Life as it was said to be in support of the new law and because it was putting up information about alleged violations of the act. GoDaddy removed Texas Right to Life on the terms that it violated the terms of service of its platform.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the Senate Bill 8?
According to this bill, abortion is considered to be outlawed once the heartbeat of a fetal is detected, which usually occurs in the sixth week of pregnancy.
When did Texas Heartbeat Act come into effect?
The Texas Heartbeat Act come into effect on 1st September 2021.
Why are Uber and Lyft paying legal fees for their drivers who sued under the Texas Abortion laws?
Both Uber and Lyft are paying legal fees for their drivers who sued under the Texas Abortion laws because they think they believe that drivers should not be put at risk for getting people where they want to go.
Uber and Lyft are working together in creating a database of their drivers. They are creating a database of the drivers who have been accused of sexual assault from the customers. They are taking the list of drivers who have been banned from the platform for sexual assaults and other crimes.
They are creating a database of people who have raised passenger-safety concerns in their platform. This safety programme is done because of the promise made by Uber, they will look into the crimes related to sexual assault. 15 months ago, they had revealed around 3,000 sexual assault cases had been reported on the company’s platform by passengers.
Let’s look at the new initiative taken by Uber and Lyft towards increasing customer safety.
The database developed by Uber and Lyft will contain information about the drivers who have been banned from the platform. Due to their involvement in sexual assaults and other crimes.
In the initial stages, Uber and Lyft will list the drivers who have been banned by the platforms in the U.S. This database will be overseen by the company HireRight. HireRight is a company that specializes in background checks and they will take care of getting more detailed information about the drivers and listing them on the database.
Reason for Creating a Database of drivers
Uber and Lyft have been criticized in the past by U.S lawmakers regarding the safety concerns for their passengers. Since then both the companies Uber and Lyft are working together towards antitrust and privacy-related concerns.
Sharing the information about the sexual assault faced by passengers by the drivers is really important. Most of the time the victims don’t file a formal complaint against the drivers. This acts as an advantage for the drivers who have been involved in those crimes and they easily escape from facing the consequences for their actions.
These drivers would easily shift from one platform to another as there are no legal procedures and actions taken against them. This would increase such crimes and the safety of the customers would be at risk.
This database platform is mainly concentrated on increasing the safety of the customers. This will make the companies in selecting the right drivers for their companies which will increase the safety of the customers.
Uber and Lyft have said that they would maintain the privacy of the victims, and wouldn’t provide any information about the victims of the incidents.
They have categorized the incidents for dismissing the drivers in six different categories which are
Attempted non-consensual sexual penetration
Non-consensual touching of a sexual body part
Non-consensual kissing of a sexual body part
Non-consensual kissing of a non-sexual body part
Non-consensual sexual penetration
Fatal physical assaults
Uber and Lyft have said that only a very small amount of the drivers have been involved in behaviors that are listed in the above categories. Hence, the companies who have access to the database can allow drivers to provide services for their platform after their own background checks and investigations.
The Companies which are involved in food deliveries, e-commerce deliveries, and companies involved in similar business models would get access to the database. Since there is a third-party company that specializes in background checks, the companies will be able to get detailed information about their drivers.
Any company that has access to the information in the database is free to hire those drivers according to their own background checks. This database will help the companies in maintaining their goodwill and increasing the safety of their customers.
This added layer of protection is being added because of the criticization made by Rape, Abuse, and Incent National network. It is a victim’s rights group which stated that the platforms are not doing a proper screening of their drivers.
FAQ
Who are the Founders of Uber?
Travis Kalanick, Garrett Camp are the founders of Uber.
What is the valuation of Uber?
As of May, 2019 Uber’s valuation was $75billion.
Who is the founder of Lyft?
Logan Green and John Zimmer are the founders of Lyft.
Conclusion
Uber has been asked to pay a fine of $59 million by California’s Public Utility Commission. When Uber had released the details of the past abuses faced by the customers, the commission had asked for the details of the victims. Uber refused to provide the details of the customers as it wanted to maintain the privacy of their customers and hence the company was asked to pay a fine.
Lyft is waiting for Uber to solve the issue related to privacy concerns so that they can release the reports about the past issues faced by their customers. This joint initiative from both the companies can be really helpful for a lot of companies and make the customers using their platform to feel more secure and safe.
Nitin Konde
