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The past 12 months have been kind to Lyft. As Uber struggled with its own challenges throughout the year, its ride-hailing competitor saw its fortunes rise, its value estimated at $7.5 billion according to Vanity Fair, which also reported Lyft’s plans to develop its own self-driving technology and partnerships with autonomous-car companies nuTonomy, Drive.ai and Waymo. In October, Google parent company Alphabet injected $1 billion of investment into Lyft, which also announced a move into its first international market –Toronto—in November. Lyft Business, which launched about two and a half years ago as the company’s B2B division, also has plans to grow its market share. Airlines have also taken to contracting with Lyft to alleviate distressed passenger traveler issues, or in other words, to move customers rebooked on flights at another local airport rather than relegating the service to local buses. Certain airlines have also bought into the service to move crew under similar circumstances. Another business development possibility for 2018 is hotel partnerships whereby Lyft credits are included in a hotel package and the hotel concierge coordinates the service on behalf of guests or the package includes airport transportation via Lyft and again, coordination and execution all happens behind the scenes for a more seamless trip. Read original article |
