It started with a knock on the door. A group of Bengaluru autorickshaw and taxi drivers, tired of losing 30 to 40 percent of their earnings to commissions, stood outside the office of Juspay, a fintech company, in Koramangala. They had a simple request: “Can you build us something better?"
They had heard about Yatri, an app in Kerala, built by Juspay, which allowed drivers to connect directly with passengers, bypassing aggregators. The app that the Karnataka auto drivers got was Namma Yatri, but it turned out to be more than an app. It would go on to change the app-based ride hailing segment in India.
Launched in November 2022, Namma Yatri would require drivers to pay a flat daily fee of ₹25 for autos and ₹90 for cabs. They could keep all of the fares they earned. No commissions. No middlemen. Only subscription.
It was a model born not in a boardroom but on the streets. With zero marketing spend, word spread. Other cities began adopting the model under different names. Yatri Saathi in West Bengal, Odisha Yatri in Odisha, and Kerala Savaari in Kerala.
But the subscription model really tipped when Rapido embraced it.
Continue reading: https://www.forbesindia.com/article/startups/ola-uber-rapido-how-cab-aggregators-are-responding-to-subscription-vs-commission-model/96379/1
