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<ul><li>Uber-owned taxi service, Yandex.Taxi, is going to equip its taxis with <keyword id="30939" type="TECHNOLOGY" weightage="20" keywordseo="facial-recognition">facial recognition</keyword> technology. </li><li>The facial recognition software will will watch for signs of fatigue and keep drivers from taking on rides if they’re exhausted. </li><li>The company is employing facial recognition to reduce the number of road accidents due to <keyword id="7962350" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="tired-taxi-drivers">tired taxi drivers</keyword>. </li></ul>It’s not uncommon to hear stories of taxi drivers taking on extra shifts to make a little more money. But, it also makes them sleepy while they are behind the wheel, multiplying risks. Yandex.Taxi, the largest taxi service in Russia that merged with Uber last year, doesn’t want tired drivers behind the wheel. So it’s going to use facial recognition to keep drivers from taking on rides if they’re exhausted. The facial recognition technology is going to watch for signs of exhaustion — like blinking, yawning and slumped posture — using a total of 68 facial points, according to <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-08-07/big-brother-to-force-moscow-s-sleepy-cab-drivers-to-take-breaks">Bloomberg</a>. Yandex has already tested the technology by mounting the device on a 100 cars in Moscow and has plans to expand it to several thousand cars in its fleet. Impetus on risk Accidents that involve taxis have <a href="http://ac.gov.ru/files/content/19540/taksi-avariinost-final-2311-pdf.pdf">surged by 25%</a> in Moscow last year. The Russian capital saw a total of <a href="https://rg.ru/2019/03/26/reg-cfo/v-moskve-rasskazali-o-roste-dtp-s-uchastiem-avtomobilej-taksi.html">764 car accidents</a> in 2018 resulting in a total of 23 deaths — and Russian legislators are pointing the finger that taxi companies. There’s already a draft law on the table that puts the Russian government in charge of monitoring taxi apps like Yandex and Uber to boost safety. While this may keep taxi drivers for taking on more rides using Uber and Yandex, there are still other taxi services that will allow them to be on call — like Gett, Taxi Saturn and Taxi Maxim. Lessons for India In India, the situation isn’t too different with taxis accounting for nearly 60% of the traffic on roads. In 2018, as many as 149,00 people died due to road accidents as many as 465,000 accidents were reported. On a global scale, India accounts for 11% of all global road accident deaths. Having regulations in place to curb sleepy drivers on the road could help India achieve its target of cutting road fatalities in half by 2020, as per the Brasilia declaration. “Ola, Uber and private cab drivers, in order to extra money, accept rides at night too, after putting in a hard day at work. As they are sleepy, they fail to pay attention to the road, thus causing accidents,” P Harishekaran, Additional Commissioner (Traffic) in Bengaluru told the <a href="http://www.newindianexpress.com/cities/bengaluru/2019/mar/26/overworked-drivers-make-cab-rides-a-risky-affair-in-bengaluru-1955969.html">New Indian Express</a>. Most drivers are working 18-hour shifts to reach targets and hone in on incentives offered by the companies. And, even that isn’t going too well with earnings taking a dip as more people sign up to a part of the ride hailing gig economy.

Uber-owned taxi service is going to facial recognition to keep tired drivers from taking on rides

If US-based <a href="http://www.businessinsider.in/searchresult.cms?query=uber">Uber</a> is rolling out incentives for drivers and passengers, Ola is also adding new segments to lure more traffic. 
 
While Ola is growing its services apart from the main taxi-booking services, Uber is going all guns to dethrone Ola from India’s largest taxi-booking service. 
 
Reportedly, both Ola and Uber have around 2,50,000 drivers registered on their networks, which is excluding auto-rickshaws and black-and yellow taxis. 
 
As Ola wants to raise valuation of about Rs 33,000 crore, investors are interested in knowing its growth strategy. 
 
"Ola's focus on other services such as grocery, which are not closely related to its core competence of providing peer-to-peer ride-sharing, may prove to be a liability. On the other hand, Uber India has been focusing on building its core business by expanding to multiple cities, stricter drivervetting, and opening customer service centres," Sunil Wattal, who teaches management information systems at Temple University in the United States, told ET. 
 
Uber might over take Ola as the former introduced cash payments also, making payment options flexible. 
 
Experts point out that Ola’s expansion has been tremendous with presence in over 100 Indian cities and generating maximum of its business from 22 cities, where Uber also plies. 
 
Meanwhile, Ola CEO Bhavish Aggarwal had earlier said that he had plans to enter new phase of growth with innovations and other large scale new ideas. 
At the same time, Uber India’s President Amit Jain wants to concentrate on its core business. 
 
"Since we entered the India market (in 2012), we have essentially been in investment mode. We have already invested tens of millions of dollars into the market as we scale our operations and capabilities," said Jain. 
 
(Image: Thinkstock)

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