Best printers for Home

Best Mixer Grinder

Best wired Earphones

Best 43 Inch TV in India

Best Wi Fi Routers

Best Home Theatre in India

Smart Watch under 5000

Best Laptops for Education

Best Laptop for Students

Don’t underestimate the power of a…Meru Cab. India’s only profit making taxi services company has recently raised around $25 million from Brand Capital, the investment arm of Bennett, Coleman and Co. Ltd (BCCL), the same group that publishes the Times of India newspaper. 
 
As per the official statement, the money will be used to strengthen the company’s foothold in the country’s domestic taxi-hailing market, increase brand awareness via advertising and promotions, and widen its customer segment. 
 “With the ongoing transformation in the taxi industry, this move is in line with the company's efforts to showcase its services to a larger customer segment via a bouquet of media channels,” said Siddhartha Pahwa, CEO, <keyword id="108722" type="PERSON" weightage="100" keywordseo="Meru-Cabs">Meru Cabs</keyword>. 
 
Since May 2015, when Meru last raised $50 million from its existing investor India Value Fund Advisors (IVFA), it has expanded its taxi service to 24 new cities, launched four new products and expanded its fleet size to over 20,000 vehicles. 
 
Meru entered the highly-competitive online taxi-hailing market back in 2007 when the Maharashtra government invited tenders for GPS-linked electronically metered cab for 10,000 cabs in 2006. 
 
Headquartered in Mumbai, Meru Cabs was launched with a mere 45 taxis back in 2007. It expanded operations to three cities in 2008, namelyDelhi, Hyderabad and Bengaluru, and followed it up with two more - Jaipur and Ahmedabad in 2013 and Chennai in 2015. 
 
India’s organized taxi-hailing market currently stands at over $1.2 billion, and is expected to touch $15 billion by 2022. This enormous opportunity at hand has led to a bitter price war between the likes of Uber and Ola. 
 
<a href="http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/photo/46617743.cms">Image Source</a> 
 
(Disclaimer: Business Insider India is a part of Times Internet Limited, the online arm of Bennett, Coleman and Co. Ltd)

Meru Cabs raises $25 million from Times Group, looking to expand further

Gone are the days when you had to contact the local travel agency to get a cab or hail one off the road or the neighborhood taxi stand. The proliferation of radio cab services across several major cities in India has allowed seamless booking of cabs anytime and anywhere over a call, and now through smartphone <keyword id="6354741" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="Apps">apps</keyword>. 
 
Uber 
 
The San Francisco-based transportation network company prefers to position itself as a technology company that offers mobile apps to connect passengers with drivers of vehicles for hire and ridesharing services. 
 The service was recently launched in India, and offers two tiers of cars for hire – UberBLACK and uberX – appealing to a broader cross-section of the market. The service, which has grown to 10 cities, is already making India the biggest market for Uber outside of the <keyword id="6356955" type="COUNTRY" weightage="20" keywordseo="united-states">United States</keyword>. 
 You need to sign up using the app with your credit card (some debit cards work too). The app shows the estimated time of arrival (ETA) of available cars around you. Once you book it, you can track the reserved car’s location on a map and contact the <keyword id="6366401" type="POSITION" weightage="20" keywordseo="Driver">driver</keyword> as well. After the ride, the amount is debited from the linked card and you don’t have to pay any cash to the driver. The app also allows ridesharing, so two friends sharing a ride can split the fare between two seamlessly. 
 
Uber is a great way to ‘hail a cab’ via an app. But you cannot book one in advance, and that sometimes is a concern, for example: you don’t want to leave a booking till last minute for a 4 am flight. 
 
Meru Cabs 
 Meru Cabs is one of the most popular and earliest radio cabs service in India. The fleet service provides services in seven cities - Mumbai, Delhi NCR, Hyderabad, <keyword id="6354321" type="CITY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Bengaluru">Bengaluru</keyword>, Jaipur, Ahmedabad, and Chennai – with two fleet levels, Meru and Meru Plus. 
 Unlike Uber, the Meru Cabs app is only needed for booking the cab. Once the cab has been booked and you’ve contacted the driver, you don’t need the app for the ride. Of course it’s good to have to check out route details and share <keyword id="154361" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="feedback">feedback</keyword>, but it’s not required. The meter is available in the car and you need to pay off the driver at the end of the trip. 
 
Also, the app allows you book a cab for a trip right away (within 35 minutes) or in advance beyond 35 minutes for up to 3 days. You can also check out you booking history from within the app. 
 
Mega Cabs 
 
Similar to Meru Cabs in service and app experience, Mega Cabs is also one of the early radio cabs service in the country. The only difference is that Mega Cabs does not have fleet/car options, and has a unified fare. 
 With presence in six cities – Delhi NCR, <keyword id="6354925" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Kolkata">Kolkata</keyword>, Bangalore, Chandigarh, Amritsar, and Ludhiana – the company claims to be India’s largest taxi service network. 
 
Olacabs 
 
Ola is quite simply the Indian Uber and has quickly grown to serve 10 cities already. Modelled on the latter, Olacabs does not own its own fleet and partners with car rental services making their cars for hire available through the app. Like Uber, there are two fleet levels, sedan and mini, and even the referral credit is the same Rs 300! 
 
Of course, the Indian company takes care of lack of penetration of credit cards in the country. You can recharge your account to keep ‘Ola Money’ in your account for frequent payments, or pay cash to the driver at the end of the trip. Also, my only gripe with Uber is taken care of as you can make a booking in advance as well. 
 
TaxiForSure 
 The latest entrant in the market, TaxiForSure, intends to bring affordable <keyword id="160739" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="cab-service">cab service</keyword> to the masses, with fares that are slightly less than the options above. Available in Bangalore, Hyderabad, Chennai, Delhi NCR, Ahmedabad, and Baroda, the service offers the option of a hatchback or sedan in most cities. 
 
Like other services, you could book a cab for a trip right away or make a booking in advance. However, the ‘right away’ is not clearly defined and there’s no way to specify an exact time. If you are making an immediate booking, you could be offered a cab in the next ten minutes or an hour later. 
(Image: Uber)

Book A Cab In India With These Slick Apps On Your Smartphone

<keyword id="205081" type="CITY" weightage="100" keywordseo="Meru">Meru</keyword>, the taxi services provider based in Mumbai, aims to be a $1 bn firm in the next six years. The company wants to expand in new cities and launch new services so that it can tap the potential of its existing markets. 
 
The company returned to profit in the December quarter after a huge gap of almost six quarters, and now aims to have a network of one lakh cars by 2022. By then, it will buy around 10,000 more vehicles. 
 
"We want to be a $ one billion organisation by 2022. We are having an year-on-year growth of 35 per cent. Last year, we grew at around 40 per cent," Meru Group CEO Siddhartha Pahwa told PTI. 
 
Meru currently operates taxi services in 23 cities, and has revenue of $ 120 million (Rs 730 crore) with a consumer base of 10 million. 
 
In the expansion plans, the company plans to expand to 45 cities by adding more tier-II cities like Patna, Bareilly, Bhopal, which have good potential by the end of next year. 
 
Out of a fleet of 20,000 cars, Meru owns 6,000 while rest are on aggregator business model. 
 
"We would continue to add 1,500- 2,000 cars every year in our own business, in which 1,000 would be for replacement of the old vehicles and rest would be addition. But on aggregator side, we are seeing 20-30 per cent growth every year," he said. 
 
"Some cities are making healthy profit at PBT level which we are ploughing back in some other cities but at gross profit level, each and every city is now making profit, which is a healthy sign," Pahwa said. 
 
"In these cities, we would continue to invest little bit more because for any city to grow, you need to make investment in terms of price offs, marketing, getting more drivers in the system. It would continue to be there," he said. 
 
Recently, Meru has launched two new services, including carpool and ride share, both of which are doing well. 
 
<a href="https://www.merucabs.com/images/meru_img6.jpg">Image source</a>

Taxi services provider Meru aims to be $1 billion firm by 2022

BANGALORE: The fight to win over the Indian taxi passenger has intensified with aggregator Olacabs and cab hailing app Uber slashing prices by a fourth in Delhi—a development that is likely to force rivals to follow suit. 
 
While Ola has cut rates in its lowerend car business—Ola mini—to Rs 10 /km, Uber has cut prices for its premium segment Uber BLACK. Separately, the San Francisco-based taxi hailing app also announced that it will be launching its affordable ride service UberX in three more Indian cities: Mumbai, Chennai and Pune. “We are pushing our efficiency system to the maximum,” said Shailesh Sawlani, general manager of Uber in Mumbai. "We see this as a daily commute option for our riders and plan to maintain these prices if customers ride with us as much as we anticipate." 
 UberX Mumbai fares are Rs 15/km with a minimum base fare of Rs 50 and total minimum fare of Rs 125. The latest moves come after Uber cut its prices in Bangalore by 25% last month. Ola also reduced fares to Rs10/km for its <keyword id="2210965" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="Ola-Mini">Ola Mini</keyword> service in the Garden City. “We have been able to optimise our inventory,” said Pranay Jivrajka, vice president of operations at Olacabs. 
 
According to industry estimates, taxi companies are struggling to keep pace with the rising demand and on average cannot accommodate a fifth of the bookings. To address this problem Ola said it will increase the number of cabs available on its mobile app by about 35% to 3,200 in Delhi alone. Ola’s total fleet size is about 15,000. 
 
“These price cuts are just a starting point to acquire customers and establishing the brand image till the time you hit a critical mass,” said Arvind Singhal, chairman of Technopak. “At Rs 10/km Ola is making losses on each Ola Mini ride,” said a source directly familiar with the matter. Same is the case with Uber, according to another source. Uber’s price drop in Bangalore is, however, for a limited duration. 
 The company has not specified the timeframe. Other competitors like TaxiFor-Sure are focussing on discount codes to expand the customer base instead of cutting prices. “We keep doing event-related promotions and offer discount vouchers from time to time,” said Aprameya Radhakrishna, founder and chief executive of <keyword id="1428790" type="COMPANY" weightage="80" keywordseo="TaxiforSure">TaxiForSure</keyword>. 
 
“Till the time, taxi aggregators will not face pressure to turn profitable, the freebies will continue,” said Jaspal Singh, cofounder of Valoriser Consultants, which provides market research services for transportation companies. “These companies are looking to build valuation by expanding geographic reach, recruiting more number of drivers and attracting bookings to increase revenue.” 
 However other aggregators like <keyword id="108722" type="PERSON" weightage="80" keywordseo="Meru-Cabs">Meru Cabs</keyword> and Savaari cabs feel that price cuts is not sustainable long-term. “Meru does not believe in price wars,” said Siddhartha Pahwa, CEO of MERU Cabs. “Consumers will not take a cab because it’s cheap but for its reliability, safety and professional service.”

Win For Customers as Taxi Companies Like Olacabs, Uber Cut Fares In Delhi, Others May Follow

Starting January, Delhi government would make sure that both Delhi’s traffic and the polluted air that floats in Delhi are kept under check. It would be done by cutting the number of private cars on its roads by about half, allowing private cars with odd digits as registration numbers on one day and those with even on the next. The Delhi government is also making sure that there are enough buses, autorickshaws and Metro coaches to accommodate the resulting number of people relying on Delhi public transports. 
 On the other hand, the brains behind taxi companies and car aggregators such as <keyword id="1042120" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Uber">Uber</keyword>, <keyword id="6354720" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Ola">Ola</keyword> and <keyword id="205081" type="CITY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Meru">Meru</keyword> Cabs are already planning on steps to take the best advantage of this step taken by the <keyword id="260213" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Arvind-Kejriwal">Arvind Kejriwal</keyword> government. 
 Uber, for example, is planning to launch <keyword id="6591085" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="UberPool">UberPool</keyword>, its car pooling service, in Delhi after a successful run in Bengaluru. While Bangalore UberPool service is only meant for commercial vehicles, the Delhi arm would target the 28 lakh private car owners. 
 
Meru, on the other hand, will be launching a mobile app in January so that passengers can pool cabs online. "The app will identify two people within a radius of two-three km travelling in the same direction and can share their taxi ride," Meru CEO Siddhartha Pahwa told ET. "The driver will pick one person first and within 10 minutes will also pick up the second person." Meru, which is already running many cabs on Delhi roads, is expecting almost 30% rise in the demand for cabs during the trial period. To attract customers, it would offer 35% discount for ride sharing. Even if a passenger can't find someone to share the ride, he or she would still be given the discount. 
 
Ola, the taxi aggregator service, recently launched minibus shuttle services in Gurgaon and Noida, which they plan to extend to Delhi. The taxi-sharing app is being beta-tested in Bengaluru right now, and could very well be rolled out in NCR to make use of the odd-even rule. 
 
Delhi is one of the world's most heavily polluted cities, which is why the government has planned to launch this odd-even scheme. Starting January 1, a 15-day trial period would begin between 8 am and 8 pm, Monday to Saturday. As per the rule, odd-numbered cars would be allowed to run on odd dates and those with even numbers would be allowed on even dates. 
 
Home Minister Rajnath Singh has given his support to this the plan at a recent meeting he had Delhi CM Kejriwal. It means that Delhi Police, which comes under the control of the central government, would be taken on board to ease the application of this rule. 
 
To discuss a carpooling policy, fleet owners and taxi aggregators, including representatives of Pool my Ride, Embarq India, Tripda.in, Carzonrent, Uber, Ola, Shuttl.com, NearGroup.in, Ibibo Ryde, Mega Carpool Pvt., Mega Cabs, LetsDriveAlong.com, BaxiTaxi, Orahi and 
Cykul, had a meeting with the members of the Delhi Dialogue Commission, which serves as the think tank of the Delhi government. 
 
<a href="http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/photo/Ola-to-invest-Rs-150-crore-in-Andhra-Pradesh/48986145.cms">Image source</a>

Cab aggregators to reap the benefits of Delhi’s Odd-Even car rule

This Diwali, cab drivers in Delhi were offered gifts ranging from LCD TVs and iPhones to scholarship for their children as cab operators are wooing drivers. Since availability of <keyword id="432469" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="100" keywordseo="cabs">cabs</keyword> is a crucial factor in winning customers’ trust and the supply is not able to keep pace with increasing demand, keeping the drivers happy seems to the key. 
 "Nothing drives an entrepreneur more than rewards," said Anand Subramaniam, director for marketing communications at <keyword id="1006428" type="COMPANY" weightage="100" keywordseo="Olacabs">Olacabs</keyword>, which has even helped drivers buy cars. "We have had occasions when 100 cars were sold in one day. Drivers with best ratings get LCD TVs and washing machines," he added. 
 
Olacabs had received $210 million (Rs 1,290 crore) from Japan's Softbank last week. 
 Apart from Olacabs, other operators like <keyword id="1042120" type="PERSON" weightage="80" keywordseo="Uber">Uber</keyword>, Ola, <keyword id="108722" type="PERSON" weightage="80" keywordseo="Meru-Cabs">Meru Cabs</keyword> and TaxiForSure are also looking to expand themselves. In India, there are about 5.5 lakh commercial cabs for 10 large cities having a total population of about 6 crore. 
 
"The biggest challenge for the industry is to balance demand and supply," said Jaspal Singh, Valoriser Consultants.

Cab Operators Lure Drivers With Cash And Gifts

You must have by now heard about Ola and Uber planning to raise their fares. This comes as real bad news for all the commuters who had started relying heavily on Ola and Uber taxis for their daily commute, owing to their economical pricing over the exorbitant fares charged by local taxis and autos. However, it seems commute is going to be a big problem all over again. 
 
Both cab aggregators have announced they are increasing their prices in the lowest category of cabs - the bracket used mostly by the middle and upper- middle class commuters. 
 
In Delhi, where Ola was charging Rs 6 per km apart from the base fare of Rs 40 for its Micro cabs, it will now be charging almost double - Rs 12 per km after the first 20 km. 
 
Same is the case with Uber. In Delhi for instance, an UberGo commuter will now have to pay Rs 12 per km after the initial 20 km against Rs 6 per km they were paying before. 
 
In Pune, the cost has been fixed at Rs 15 per kilometre for UberGo rides beyond the first 15 km. For Vizag it’s Rs 12 per kilometre after first 15 km and for Kolkata, it is Rs 12 per km after first 10 km. 
 
Similarly the Ola commuters in Bangalore would also need to shell out Rs 12 per km as compared to Rs 6 all through the journey earlier. 
For Chennai, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Kolkata, the fare scheme for Ola Micro is same as Bangalore. 
 
Both Ola and Uber have taken this move to earn profits, as per the news reports. However, this price war also poses the right opportunity for rivals like Meru Cabs to grab their share in the market. 
 
Interestingly, Meru is already giving discounts to customers. It has recently introduced Exactometer, a system where the rider needs to pay exactly the fare estimated before the start of the trip, to counter the disruptive fare rates of Ola and Uber. 
 
It remains to be seen how this steep fare hike will go down with customers, and who really will have the last laugh.

With fares almost
doubled, riding an Ola or Uber will no longer be your cheapest bet

Hopping from one app to another, looking for a cab is an irritant and consumes a lot of time. This grumble by consumers was heard by Shalak Nail and Neha Bora, who have come up with taxi app aggregator-Loco Cabs. 
 <keyword id="3170727" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="Loco-Cabs">Loco Cabs</keyword>, which was launched this year, has data of all cabs, such as <keyword id="6354720" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Ola">Ola</keyword> and <keyword id="1042120" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Uber">Uber</keyword>, on one single app. 
 "We started with the app showing the cabs available close by and then a few months ago we approached Uber and Ola (and <keyword id="1428790" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="TaxiforSure">TaxiForSure</keyword>) to allow us to be able to facilitate their bookings as well," Naik told ET. 
 
By aggregating all taxi apps on one, taxi aggregators are to gain only as window will open to more users. 
 
Loco Cabs works as an aggregator for small-time travel companies and cab owners making intercity and overnight trips. 
 
Loco Cabs has tied up with Paytm and CCavenue and is in talks with Meru and Mega Cabs as well. 
 
Apart from cabs, they are also planning to add bus service. 
 
"The immediate priority is India but then as the market matures, we'd like to be a platform for all your surface travel needs. When you need to travel, you should be able to get the cheapest and fastest option here," said Naik.

You Searched For "Meru Cabs" and got 8 results

Meru Cabs raises $25 million from Times Group, looking to expand further

BI India Bureau

Book A Cab In India With These Slick Apps On Your Smartphone

Gizmodo India Bureau

Taxi services provider Meru aims to be $1 billion firm by 2022

BI India Bureau

Win For Customers as Taxi Companies Like Olacabs, Uber Cut Fares In Delhi, Others May Follow

Economic Times

Cab aggregators to reap the benefits of Delhi’s Odd-Even car rule

BI India Bureau

Cab Operators Lure Drivers With Cash And Gifts

BI India Bureau

With fares almost doubled, riding an Ola or Uber will no longer be your cheapest bet

Suchayan Mandal

Now, you can book Ola, Uber from one single app! Here’s how

BI India Bureau

Popular Keywords

Buying Guides