US taxi hailing app Uber Inc. is coming to Israel to challenge rival GetTaxi Ltd. in its home base. Uber has published three positions on its career page for an office it is now setting up in Tel Aviv. Uber is seeking a local manager, operations and logistics manager, and content manager.
Uber is the leading US taxi hailing app, and also operates in London, and scores of other cities worldwide. It was the market pioneer and GetTaxi followed in its wake. The two companies are rivals in New York and London, although they operate in different market segments so there is no direct competition.
There have been a number of media reports lately that Uber, which has an estimated valuation of $4 billion after raising $307 million from Goldman Sachs, Google Ventures, Jeff Bezos, Eric Schmidt, Michael Arrington, and other tier-1 investors, may be headed for an IPO.
GetTaxi and Uber went head-to-head in New York in January, when Uber tried to disrupt GetTaxi's service and steal its drivers. In Israel, other taxi hailing apps have failed to offer significant competition to GetTaxi or affect its dominance in the market.
GetTaxi said in response, "We welcome healthy competition against any company. We have no doubt that, for the first time, if a rival actually enters the mobile taxi hailing market, it will only increase the pie of users, which will benefit drivers and consumers alike."
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on February 26, 2014
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