A Kenyan taxi-hailing app called Little Cab is set to take on the Nigerian market from October, moving on to turf currently dominated by more established players in Uber and Taxify.
Kenyan tech firm Craft Silicon’s on-demand ride service, which is backed by leading East African mobile operator Safaricom, will launch operations in the Nigerian city of Lagos from October 8, according to DailyNation.
The taxi-hailing app is successfully providing competition to Uber in the Kenyan market, operating in Nairobi, Kisumu and Mombasa.
Little Cab has so far signed up more than 1,600 drivers in Kenya, outnumbering Uber’s 1,000 or so drivers, according to PulseLive.
Their Nigerian expansion will be the first venture for the company outside of Kenya.
In comparison, rivals Uber already operate in 14 cities across eight African countries, including Johannesburg, Cape Town, Nairobi, Kampala, and Lagos.
Known for its reliance on innovation to compete with the likes of Uber’s deep pockets, Little Cab will make around 5,000 drivers available in Lagos for their launch in early October, according to DiscoverLagosCity.
The company offers users an innovative feature that uses Microsoft cognitive API to provide facial recognition technology, with drivers taking selfies to log in and the company using its database to verify the driver’s credentials, ensuring the safety of passengers.
Little Cab CEO Kamal Budhabatti
“Our team is already in Nigeria ahead of the official launch set for October 8 and we are hoping to grow the business further in the continent,” Budhabatti said, according to BusinessDailyAfrica.
“Locally, we are the first to venture into Kisumu city and we will be rolling out the service to other towns that our surveys suggest need the e-hailing service,” he added.
“Nigeria is where we have our biggest continental operations as Craft Silicon and so we believe we have leverage there. The same applies for Uganda where we are also based,” he said.
