Volkswagen believes its Moia mobility unit can
ultimately rival Uber and Lyft, despite being years behind the pack and still
in its infancy.The company will leverage
VW’s manufacturing capacity to deliver advanced self-driving vehicles to serve
in its fleet which will include ride-hailing, ride pooling and car sharing.
Moia was established in late 2016 and not only is that
well behind ride-hailing leaders Uber and Lyft, it is also behind Daimler’s
Car2Go and BMW’s DriveNow which were established in 2008 and 2011 respectively.
Moia will develop cars with VW
that work seamlessly with ride-sharing applications. Additionally, Moia’s
position with the VW Group will allow it to produce self-driving vehicles at a
large scale with minimal effort. By comparison, some dedicated ride-hailing
companies don’t have things so easy.
Moia’s first focus is on ride-pooling and it’s
currently running a test service in the German city of Hanover with 35
vehicles. Within the next two years, this program will swell to include 500
vehicles. The company says that it is also in talks with 50 cities across the
globe with the intention of launching similar projects.
