Google’s carpooling service Waze is expanding its services throughout California. This also includes Los Angeles, and this marks the biggest roll out of the service till date. The area has become a hotspot for car-hailing startups, and has attracted companies like Uber, Ford, General Motors and other start-ups.
Up until now, the car pooling service was only available in the San Francisco Bay Area. So now, to use the able the Waze Carpool app to hail rides from Waze drivers who are already going along their path. Similarly, drivers going along a certain path will be able to pick up riders going along a particular road.
Speaking on the topic, Josh Fried, head of Waze Carpool told Reuters:
Carpooling takes density and doing it on a limited capacity, you can only learn so much. We wanted to expand to a Waze hub. It’s our first attempt to see if we can go big into a region.
Expanding the service in Los Angeles certainly makes a lot of sense. Waze has the greatest concentration of its users in the area and as such, expanding the service will allow the company to generate greater revenue.
So now, when riders hail a ride from a driver going a particular way, they will be liable to share the total cost of the ride at a federal mileage rate of $.54 per mile. The company currently does not generate a revenue from this but plans to start taking a cut eventually.
Waze currently takes no cut of the transaction but will eventually take a commission when the quality of the service is high enough to warrant this.
For instance, the company does take a commission in Israel, where it was first founded. There, it takes a 15 percent commission every ride. For now, the company is focusing on expansion and plans to reach Brazil by the end of the year.
