Uber's bumpy ride in India

Uber completes two years in India. Tech in Asia tells you how the company has held up despite its struggles

This past Friday marked Uber’s second year running in India. Although the ridesharing giant has been through quite a bit, India has become its second largest market after China. The time it has spent in the country has been far from easy.

However, Uber’s struggles in India will end soon – just last week, the Indian central government finally released a series of guidelines for ridesharing apps. Although this comes as a sign of relief, each state government will have the right to pass its own laws, so Uber’s not entirely out of the regulatory woods yet.


 

The company has made several moves to win back the approval of the general public. In February, it tied up with Safetipin, a map-based mobile app that collects data about different parts of cities and scores them on a safety scale. Uber drivers were asked to mount smartphones on the outside of their cabs in order to capture photos of Indian cities at night.
 

It also installed an ‘SOS’ feature in its app that would allow passengers to contact police directly. Passengers were also given the ability to ‘share’ their ride details with their friends and have their progress be tracked via GPS.
 

The cab service has also started to work with the government on skill development. This past month, it agreed to train and certify over 100,000 individuals to work as drivers on its platform over the next three years.
 

Uber also recently partnered with Airtel in order to provide wifi access in cabs, a first. 
 

As one Tech in Asia commenter put it, “Has Uber ever had a greater learning experience than what it’s seen in India?”

This is an excerpt from Tech in Asia. You can read the full article here.