Transportation Archives - Serious Startups

Uber: Mobile Web App launched for those “other OSes” Windows Phone 7 and Blackberry

Yesterday Uber announced on their blog that they would begin to support Blackberry and Windows Phone 7 devices (and beyond, whatever that means). With the launch of m.uber.com users of the once dominant and almost relevant Operating Systems can finally take advantage of one of my personal favorite startups.

Prior to the mobile app being launched it was not possible to order a cab through devices other than iOS or Android, before that even Android was waiting in line (pun intended). Uber said in their blog post,

We’re excited to announce that our latest product, m.uber.com has been built with love and care for BlackBerry, Windows Phone and beyond! We want to make the Uber experience available to everyone, regardless of phone or carrier. That’s why we’ve introduced mobile web requests to let you request an Uber at any time from any phone……And when you make requests, you can also save favorite locations for places you frequently request from, such as home or work.

We recently stopped in to Uber’s Washington DC office but did not get a chance to spend any time talking to them about their expansion into new cities nor could we discuss the full-blown assault by the DC Taxi Cab Association. We are huge fans of the service though and we have been keeping a close eye on when they will be invading my hometown of Philadelphia. If you are in Boston, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Paris, Seattle, Chicago, Toronto, or New York and you haven’t used Uber yet….you should. It’s that good.

Ford & Yahoo Team Up For Reality Show About Electric Cars

Being on the road in a Prius makes you really appreciate both the hybrid and the full on electric car. While traveling to cover startups in Chattanooga, Tennessee, Cameron and I saw charging stations out in front of local government office buildings, which was a breath of fresh air. We also brought you this story earlier this month about a NC startup that is re-inventing the charging station.

With all this talk about electric cars it’s no wonder that Ford has teamed up with Yahoo to release a web-based reality show about electric cars.

The new show called “Plugged In” will chronicle the lives of three two person teams driving the new Ford Focus electric. The teams will compete in scavenger hunt like challenges in 10 major cities including Los Angeles in New York, mostly on the east and west coast where electric cars are gaining popularity and where gas is over $4.00 per gallon and quickly approaching $5.00.

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Google Tries to Prove It’s Self Driving Cars Are Safe By Putting A Blind Man Behind The Wheel

Google, never one for standing still and always trying to push the boundaries of what it can do, upped it’s self with it’s latest video. They put a legally blind man behind the wheel of one of their self driving cars to show that on public roads, that anyone can get behind the wheel of one of their cars safely. First thing they did was take a drive to Taco Bell, as you’ll be able to see in the video, there was a Google employee next to him to make sure nothing happened.

The car moved with ease stopping at red lights, as well as going through the drive through. One of the major advantages of this is that in the future when this becomes widely adapted, those with disabilities could go around with no issues at all.

With $17 Million In New Funds Hailo May Make It To U.S. Before Uber Gets To London

Private car service app Uber has taken the U.S. by storm in the select markets they are doing business in. You simply download the app and have a car come and get you (in select markets). Across the pond in London there’s another company operating in both London and Dublin, doing the same thing with taxicabs.

We profiled Hailo a few weeks back. The startup came about from three taxi drivers as a way to provide more fares and make the taxi experience in the UK more social. Long gone are the days where a taxi driver needs to wait all day at a cab stand or a passenger needs to stand on the street corner to wave somebody down.

With Hailo (like Uber) a few taps of an app and your taxicab is on the way. They also allow you to pay through the app with a credit or debit card and of course you can pay the cab driver with cash. They’ll also hold the meter off for five minutes.

Hailo has already seen 200,000 downloads from consumers in London and over 3200 taxi drivers have downloaded it. Hailo has about 1700 cabs using the app for fares.

TechCrunch reported yesterday that Hailo had raised $17 million in a series A round led by Accel Partners. The company is looking to bring Chicago, Boston, Washington DC, and New York on rather quickly. Hailo’s CEO Jay Bregman does realize that it will be a hurdle to get over New Yorks stringent taxicab regulations.

As with their London market, Hailo isn’t looking to provide cabbies with full time work but rather supplement their normal amount of fares with extra fares. Hailo has also enlisted the help of drivers that are using the app to take on management roles within the cities they service.

American rival Uber just finished a $32 million dollar round of financing and said that they hope to be operational in London before this summer’s Olympics. The main difference between Uber and Hailo is that Uber uses private car companies while Hailo is striving by working with actual cabs ,a move that could potentially make customers feel safer and more comfortable with the transaction.

source: TC

Ridearoo, A Startup That Originated At Drexel University, Expands To Every College Campus In Philly

Ridearoo is a start up in Philadelphia that was founded by Drexel University graduates Andy Guy and Aksel Gungor. They started ridearoo in 2010 and now it’s starting to pick up traction and is available to all college students in Philadelphia.

Ridearoo isn’t some national gigantic network of rideshares, Ridearoo is designed to be implemented in organizations like colleges, universities and companies with large campuses. Each organization that utilizes the Ridearoo system supplies their students, workers or community members with a password that is customized for their organization. This way students at Temple University don’t have to comb through drivers and riders at say Villanova. The same would hold true as Ridearoo picks up more clients with companies.

The founders of Ridearoo characterize the service in their own words as:

“We offer a private, online tool to organizations that allows commuters within that organization to set up carpools with colleagues and peers.”

The Ridearoo service is easy there are three simple steps:

1. Tell Ridearoo your daily commute or special trip

2. Find matches who are going to the same areas or on the same route

3. Join rides

Ridearoo started when Gungor found a ride share board at Drexel University, the idea was born out of that. They then took the ride share board online in the first iteration of Ridearoo. Now it serves every college campus in Philadelphia with plans to expand to other colleges, universities, business campuses and other organizations.

To find out more about Ridearoo visit ridearoo.com

Hailo Cab Let’s You Hail A Yellow Cab In London With Your iPhone or Android

While hot tech start up Uber is preparing to embark on London before the 2012 Olympic games there is already an app available for iPhone and Android that lets people in England hail a taxicab.

The app called Hailo is a network that matches passengers and licensed taxi drivers. The app makes cabbies days more sociable and allows British taxi drivers to go to destination fairs rather than waiting at taxistands all day.

The app is great because it beats calling a taxi. Instead the user can click a button on their Hailo app and a cab is dispatched to them. Hailo promises you’re never two clicks away from a taxi. Hailo allows you to pay by credit card or debit card in-app or in cash to the driver. Hailo cab drivers will even wait five minutes before starting the meter.

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Uber Facing Outcry From DC Taxi Cab Association

Uber is one of those start-ups that many of us love. It works great in the major cities that they are already in. In fact our Editor in Chief, uses Uber in New York City without fail.

If you’re not familiar with Uber it is a car service that allows you to order up a car for where you need to go via an iPhone or Android app. There is a set rate of $7.00 for the initial trip and $3.25 per mile. The meter is tracked on your smartphone and the customer and Uber know exactly what is charged at the time of the trip.

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We have the ability to stop your freedom of speech, and now the ability to crash your plane

That is the statement that New York Police Department Commissioner Ray Kelly told 60 Minutes tonight. With the inability to trust his own government Kelly needed a way to play God and be able to control everything people do in his jurisdiction.

“We couldn’t rely on the federal government alone.”

While we understand the wish to protect your area, this may have gone to far. Here is an snip of the interview from the video below.

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Ford E-Bike concept vehicle

Earlier this month at the Frankfurt Auto Show, Ford Motor Company had a bike on display it’s called the Ford E-Bike concept and is a rather stark departure from typical auto show flair. Not that it is any less showy or has any less innovation – it’s that it is “just a bike.”

The bike has a fresh frame design and comes packed with technology. The front wheel houses an electric motor with a 9.2Ah battery that can propel the bike 25 kph (15.5 mph) while the rear wheel is powered by conventional means – you. Instead of using a traditional chain the bike uses a carbon chain.

Engadget was over in Germany and managed to get a number of photos including one that clearly shows a smartphone resting in a custom dock on the handle bars. This was a Samsung Galaxy S II – and this piece of kit actually controls aspects of the bike. custom software built-in riders will be able to monitor the battery level and change some aspects of the suspension. Of course, if it is a fully functional Android device it would come with all the mainstays of Google’s Android Operating System.

If a bike such as this were to be released I like the idea of having the phone automatically adjust to the docking system on the bike and put Google Maps into “Bike Mode” bringing up both local roads as well as bike trails, automatically launch an app to monitor your heart rate, cadence, and travel route. I would love to spend some time with this vehicle and its different settings. I’ve put out a request to the people at Ford to see if this could be a possibility.

Engadget via Uncrate