Taxi app Hailo is pulling out of North America because of a price war

HAILO, THE LONDON-BASED taxi-hailing app startup, is leaving North America, reports Financial Times.

In addition, its co-founder and co-CEO, Jay Bregman, will leave the company. Tom Barr, Hailo’s other CEO, will take the reins.

The company provides a way for users to hail cabs with their phone, so while it has competed in the same market as Uber and Lyft, it’s not as anti-taxi as Uber has been.

In fact, Hailo works with local taxis, which run a meter and allow Hailo to take 10% commission from customers’ fares (12% in Ireland).

However, it seems competition from Uber and Lyft have caused Hailo to bow out of the U.S. and Canada.

“When we moved into North America, we had two entrenched first-mover competitors,” Barr told Financial Times.

They are in a price war. It’s not that we aren’t growing there, but the profitability of the market and the type of environment [that other taxi-app companies] are setting up – both on the driver and passenger side – ceased to make sense to us.

As of now, Hailo operates in roughly 30 cities globally, and has more than 1.4 million registered customers.

- Maya Kosoff

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