[TusharK]

According to a media report, cab aggregator Ola is entering the self-drive business with an investment of US$ 500 million.

Ola will launch a pilot service with around 10,000 vehicles including luxury sedans and SUVs in select cities in the coming weeks. The company will test out various formats including rental and subscription-based products as well as leasing services for corporates.



Currently, self-drive rental services are offered by Zoomcar, Myles and Drivezy. Reports suggest that Ola plans to focus on the top 5-7 markets, however the scale of service would make it the largest self-drive rental company in India.

Earlier this month, Hyundai and Kia announced an investment of US$ 300 million in Ola. Flipkart co-founder Sachin Bansal has also invested Rs. 650 crore in the ride-hailing company.

Source: Economic Times

Link to Team-BHP News

[ashikthomson]

This is going to be a big shift in the rental scenario, where now a days all the services are fragmented and even the well known players in the field fail to provide a consistent and satisfactory user experience.
Also the ola fleet is said to be including SUVs and luxury sedans which is a very welcoming move, considering the fact that these type of rental prices will gradually then come a little bit down.

[Rajeevraj]

Good to see a large player like Ola enter the self drive market. The quality and reliability of self drive services have been slowly deteriorating and I think the overall segment needs a shake up. Ola entering the segment in a big way would definitely help in this.

Will not be a pretty site for our highways though. Will definitely put more cars on the road and those long weekend toll queues are going to get longer.

[GTO]

If I were part of Zoom / Myles / Revv, I'd be petrified! Ola is aggressive, has tons of money in the bank and importantly, knows how to scale. Within a year itself, someone like Ola has the capability to build a fleet 10 times larger than Zoom. Hyundai also recently invested big bucks in Ola and became a partner.

Just hoping they manage the quality of cars. Shouldn't be difficult as Ola does a pretty good job with its cabs. But there's a difference between a professional driver taking care of his cab and multiple customers. Indians really don't know how to treat someone else's property.

[Sahil]

Originally Posted by GTO

If I were part of Zoom / Myles / Revv, I'd be petrified!

Petrified...or Ecstatic!

My hunch is Ola will buy out one or more of these companies to scale quicker. Some of these companies have been built to be attractive buyouts for competitors, an early exit with a good valuation is an ideal scenario for the investors.

Ola is way bigger than Uber in India, I won't be surprised if they buy them out soon too. Uber is focusing on other markets more aggressively, they recently bought out UAE's Careem app that was killing them in Dubai for $3 billion.
When you can't win them, join them! Another case in point- Just today Airbnb invested in Oyo rooms.

[locusjag]

Originally Posted by Rajeevraj

Will not be a pretty site for our highways though. Will definitely put more cars on the road and those long weekend toll queues are going to get longer.

I have had something else in mind; this could bring down the numbers of cars in our cities. A number of people would opt to rent out cars rather than own them. Parking issues won't get any worse if the number of cars goes down because of this. The number of cars clogging daily commutes should go down, since weekend renters would be utilizing public transport on weekdays (entirely hypothetical, I know). This also means that people could potentially use their available financial resources wisely; to put it crudely - if it is just a bit of milk that i need from time to time, why would I own a cow?

Brickbats are expected and accepted

[libranof1987]

I hope Ola has a quick word with Zoomcar on their rather abysmal experience providing self-drive luxury vehicles.

Homegrown ride-hailing app Ola is in talks with luxury carmakers such as Audi, Mercedes and BMW to launch a subscription-based self-driving service. According to agency reports, Ola is trying to bring a subscription-based model in India, where users can get access to luxury cars for a subscription fee.

https://www.businesstoday.in/current...ry/338996.html

[Samurai]

Originally Posted by GTO

Indians really don't know how to treat someone else's property.

Ola will have to build a rating system for renters. Car abusers should get negative ratings, and once they hit certain threshold, they can't rent anymore.

Otherwise, this business just won't survive. The abusers will destroy all the cars, and good drivers will loathe to rent bad cars.

[KungFuPanda]

I hope they offer a good range of Premium cars. If the way they have watered down their Lux and Exec offerings in the Ola app from initial launch days is any indication, I do not have high expectations of the cars that will be offered by them.

On a side note, I don't think any one in India does a fair job of offering premium self drive cars. I take at least two week rentals in a year and have tried everything from Zoom, Revv, Myles, AVIS to Driven. The choice of premium cars is abysmal in the market. Only Driven has a decent variety of cars, however their costs are extremely high. Maybe OLA can pull it off if they have a decent variety of cars against a rational pricing model.

[GTO]

Originally Posted by libranof1987

Homegrown ride-hailing app Ola is in talks with luxury carmakers such as Audi, Mercedes and BMW to launch a subscription-based self-driving service.

That's awesome! I hope they bring some larger Germans too (e.g. E-Class) and not just the entry-level models.

Originally Posted by Samurai

Ola will have to build a rating system for renters. Car abusers should get negative ratings, and once they hit certain threshold, they can't rent anymore.

I so agree with this . But they'll have to handle any potential backlash carefully. On Uber, the ratings are peer-to-peer. It's a completely different matter for a company to rate its customers!

Plus, a lot of times, the abuse doesn't come from just 1 drive. Rather, cars get worn out after hundreds of rough drivers (as is clearly the case with Zoom Cars).

[ksameer1234]

Originally Posted by GTO

It's a completely different matter for a company to rate its customers!

Why not have some third-party underwrite the renters' behaviour? There is already an option with self-drive options to buy insurance for the ride. That can be made mandatory and then telematics be used to create a profile for renters which can dictate the cost of insurance. Telematics driven insurance should find far more acceptability with self-drive than private owners. With the scale of Ola, renters will also have incentive to drive safely and thus save on cost of renting.

Plus, a lot of times, the abuse doesn't come from just 1 drive. Rather, cars get worn out after hundreds of rough drivers

Telematics can easily identify rough drivers and user profiles built over time can help separate wheat from chaff.

[Chetan_Rao]

Given how self-drive rentals are treated, both by customers and the rental company themselves, it won't matter what cars are launched on what platform unless some accountability is built into the process.

I've never had a happy experience with any of them, unless the car I was supplied was new. Even 10-15k kms run specimens from Zoomcar and Revv are in terrible condition. My last Revv rental Ecosport in late March was in such a horrifying condition, my feedback to the company just said 'I would be ashamed to handover such a car to anyone even for free, forget expecting a customer to pay for it'.

[GTO]

Originally Posted by ksameer1234

With the scale of Ola, renters will also have incentive to drive safely and thus save on cost of renting.

This line made me think & the likes of Ola + Zoom should definitely take it further.

Instead of penalising bad drivers, reward the good ones. Give them additional discounts for "good behaviour" or similar. Indians love discounts and the minute they see a carrot big enough, they'll drive the Ola / Zoom Car like they do their own.

[Chetan_Rao]

Originally Posted by GTO

....

Instead of penalising bad drivers, reward the good ones. Give them additional discounts for "good behaviour" or similar. Indians love discounts and the minute they see a carrot big enough, they'll drive the Ola / Zoom Car like they do their own.

As a society, we love carrots but we only respect the stick when it comes to falling in line. Unfortunate, but true.

Most platforms have discounts of some sort round the year, but the small minority of good renters still end up with abused cars driven by maniacs, maintained by staff with ZERO mechanical empathy and fleets owned by companies whose only standard of quality assurance is 'Saar, it starts and it moves! What more do you want?'

Good renters need to be incentivized, absolutely, but the ground reality won't change until the bad renters are made to pay for their behavior (more expensive rentals, higher insurance add-ons, what have you).

Not an apples to apples comparison given the markets are different, but for the equivalent of 40-odd US Dollars per day, here's what one gets in India today:



Beat up Ecosport with ~100k on the odo, bits and pieces missing everywhere and what would essentially qualify to be a death-trap by any respectable standards.

Here's what one gets in the US:



Nearly brand-new Grand Cherokee, less than 5000 miles on the odo, and a fantastic experience overall.

Difference? It costs a LOT to trash a rental in the US.

[Sunil2307]

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