Uber for motorbikes enters Bangalore, will be cheapest (legal) travel option in city

Uber today announced the launch of its motorbike-on-demand service UberMOTO in Bangalore.

It claims to be the city’s most affordable transportation option. The base minimum fare for an UberMOTO is US$0.22, with rates calculated at US$.04 for each kilometer plus US$0.01 for each minute. Riders can pay through the app or with cash. “Ever since we launched Uber in Bangalore, we’ve constantly looked for ways to give you back both your time and money,” the transportation giant said in a statement.

Last week, Uber announced the launch of the same service in Bangkok.

In some ways, this is a move that’s particularly helpful for Bangalore. Uber’s statement cites the example of using UberMOTO to travel “to and from public transit services like the metro station.”

In Bangalore, a big criticism of the up-and-coming metro system is that it lacks parking lots. The city is also notorious for its traffic.The last feature rolled out in the city, Uber’s carpooling service UberPool, also attempted to ease the city’s traffic woes.

Learn from competition

Photo credit: Nagesh Jayaraman.

Other competitors in the city include the recently launched Rapido. Until a few weeks ago, it was illegal to use two-wheelers as on-demand commercial vehicles in the state. It’s good that Uber waited for the regulation to pass, because a similar service, HeyTaxi!, was banned in Mumbai for breaking motor vehicle rules last year.

Most states have been stringent about their two-wheeler laws. The state of Haryana only made it legal for two-wheelers to operate commercially in early December last year, a move that Ashutosh Johri, founder of two-wheeler on-demand service Baxi Taxi, takes credit for. “It was easier to make this happen than it was to raise funding,” he explained to us in an earlier interview.

Uber has announced that it will provide riders with helmets and enforce seatbelt regulations, but there are other important aspects to open-air transportation in India. In Gurgaon, services like M-Taxi and Baxi Taxi also offer riders facial wipes.

It will also be interesting to see what types of motorbikes will be allowed to operate on the new service. With over 3.8 million two-wheelers in just the state of Karnataka (where Bangalore sits) alone, everyone is going to want to participate in Uber’s latest scheme.

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