There’s a lot of news in sharing economy transportation right now. Some new companies, some fun options I’ve just recently discovered, and Ford Motors is even dipping a toe into peer to peer rentals. The companies listed below (except Ford) can all be found on my table of sharing economy travel services which I update whenever I learn about new businesses and services.
Tripda began offering ridesharing services in the Philippines in May after that country legalized ridesharing. Early this year, Tripda secured US$11 million funding from Rocket Internet and other investors. It will use the fresh capital to expand its global operations and grow its user base in 13 countries where it operates.
A new ridesharing network, Split, launched in Washington DC in 2015
And in other ridesharing news: Google is testing out a new ridesharing app for commuters called Ridewith. The test is being run in Israel by Waze, a recent acquisition of Google.
Various forms of ridesharing and peer to peer taxis are becoming popular in India. The latest entrant, Slimride, facilitates shared taxis in Bangalore to/from the airport. Also Blablacar recently partnered with IRCTC, a subsidiary of Indian Railways, to offer ridesharing to users of the irctc.com website.
Interested in driving around the U.S. in a rental car without paying? This isn’t really peer to peer (sharing economy), but it’s free and so earns a mention here. Transfercarus offers free one-way car and RV rentals of new vehicles that need to be moved across the country. This is part of a larger company that also operates in Australia and New Zealand.
You could drive this RV for free
Uber announced a new service, UberBoat, ferrying people between the Asian and European sides of Istanbul.
Uber is making a move into alternative vehicle taxi services adding the boat taxi to a rickshaw service in India that they announced a few months ago.
And lastly, in a growing trend of commercial transportation and lodging companies investing in sharing economy businesses, Ford motors announced a peer to peer car sharing program. The test program will allow people who are making monthly payments on a Ford-financed car to earn money.