Amid India’s GCC Boom, Uber Takes The Corporate Transport Lane

Uber has entered the corporate commute space with the employee transportation services vertical launched earlier this year

The mobility giant aims to address the demand in India’s booming GCC sector for a centralised, tech-enabled corporate commute management solution

It has onboarded fleets of existing vendors in the space, while also cross-utilising drivers in its B2C arm, and plans to leverage its tech expertise

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Every evening, hatchbacks and tempo travellers throng the Outer Ring Road of Bengaluru, a city that more than a million tech professionals call their home. With its 67,000 registered IT firms, 16,000 startups, numerous banks, and 400 of Fortune 500 companies, the city doesn’t sleep, indeed. 

Company cabs aren’t just enough to ferry an ever-increasing brigade of tech professionals working 24×7 in Bengaluru. Most enterprises, therefore, depend on vendors like MoveInSync, Routematic, and Rego Cabs that operate in the corporate commute space. Global mobility giant Uber too rolled into this bustling market for employee transportation services (ETS) earlier this year. 

“We are seeing large corporates setting up their GCCs in India and large IT companies and large banks expanding their offices in India. We see that the demand for employee transportation has increased over the last 5-10 years,” Likhitha Goud, who heads the ETS wing at Uber India, told Inc42. 

“We are seeing large corporates setting up their GCCs in India and large IT companies and large banks expanding their offices in India. We see that the demand for employee transportation has increased over the last 5-10 years,” Likhitha Goud, who heads the ETS wing at Uber India, told Inc42. 

India is projected to have over 2.8 Mn people working at 2,500 GCCs by 2030, as the market for Global Capability Centres (GCCs) looks set to explode in the coming years, surpassing $100 Bn in revenue. It’s evident that global giants no longer consider their Indian outfits as low-cost back offices, but as critical sources of value creation across functions.

The GCC market boom has set the corporate mobility services on a fast track to reach $13 Bn by 2030. After more than 12 years of offering its core ride-hailing services in India, Uber spotted the opportune moment to expand into the B2B segment. 

Adding Tech Edge to Corporate Mobility

Largely fragmented models have so far been the solutions for corporate commute management. But, organisations, GCCs in particular, are moving towards centralised, tech-enabled, single-vendor models. The use of dedicated software platforms and automation makes for a more efficient and scalable solution, and enables greater control and predictability. 

This answers why Uber believes it can make a splash even in an industry dominated by smaller, but seasoned, players. The company’s ETS strategy rests on two core pillars that it believes could give it a leg-up in the competition – its tech chops and its fleet capabilities. 

“One of the core tech modules of ETS is routing. When you have employees residing in different localities and you find the best way to put multiple employees in one single car, bring them from their homes to office, and again drop them back from office to their homes,” Goud summarised. 

“One of the core tech modules of ETS is routing. When you have employees residing in different localities and you find the best way to put multiple employees in one single car, bring them from their homes to office, and again drop them back from office to their homes,” Goud summarised. 

Routing algorithms power Uber’s core ride-hailing platform where it matches drivers and riders. Banking on its years of data and tech talent pool, the company believes it can offer its corporate customers a mobility solution that minimises the number of trips required to move their workforce back and forth and hence brings in cost efficiencies. 

Uber also aims to deliver a positive commute experience. That’s important considering that organisations see employee experience and safety as the two top value-drivers in corporate mobility solutions with 35% and 26% weightage. 

“Uber has some of the best safety standards globally built into its tech stack such as access to an SOS button during the ride, live tracking of the trips and sharing the ride information with their friends and family. These are also now available to the same employees who are taking the trips through their companies,” Goud said. 

“Uber’s tech philosophy is very user-friendly. Nobody needs to train you how to use the Uber app and we will give the same experience to the employees we serve in ETS with user-friendly UX and features.” 

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Optimising The Fleet Mix For B2B Venture

Another core strength that Uber plans to lean on is its fleet capabilities. In over-a-decade of operations in India, it has built a massive network, effectively organising and scaling the fragmented space of fleet operators. The mobility giant invested $20 Mn into Everest Fleet, its largest fleet partner in India, last November. 

The company was also the lead investor in Carrum, a CarDekho-backed fleet operator, in its $7 Mn Series A funding round in January. 

Uber is now tapping into parts of its core B2C ride-hailing network for the ETS vertical. The move also benefits the drivers from an earnings perspective, which Goud sees as a win-win situation. 

“In B2B, the peak commute shifts are in the morning and evening. These drivers, who are doing trips for some of the clients on the enterprise side, also work on the B2C during the non-peak hours. They have predictable earnings from working on the B2B side, and are also able to get additional income from those B2C trips. So, cross-utilisation improves the overall earnings per car for the fleet partner,” the Uber India ETS head said. 

“In B2B, the peak commute shifts are in the morning and evening. These drivers, who are doing trips for some of the clients on the enterprise side, also work on the B2C during the non-peak hours. They have predictable earnings from working on the B2B side, and are also able to get additional income from those B2C trips. So, cross-utilisation improves the overall earnings per car for the fleet partner,” the Uber India ETS head said. 

While this is optimal from a fleet utilisation perspective, one could also raise questions about whether the same vehicles and drivers in the B2C network meet the standards of service expected by large enterprises. Uber is trying to resolve this by ensuring that its B2B supply contains a mix of dedicated vehicles. These come from fleet partners who have a long history in the B2B space, and can consequently bring their expertise to bolster Uber’s ETS business. 

“We have a number of partners who have been in the industry for quite some time. We are learning the ropes from our partners on how to run the B2B business. They are also keen to partner with Uber as using Uber’s tech stack makes their entire vehicle management and driver management much easier for traditional B2B players.” 

Driving Down The Fast Lane Into The Future

Although fresh into the ETS space, Uber has entered the core metro markets of Delhi-NCR, Mumbai, Pune, Bangalore, Hyderabad, and Chennai. 

Uber plans to tap into the densest demand centres right off the bat as these six metros host 92% of GCCs in India. From a supply capacity perspective, it also has a strong operational network in place as five of these six cities are Uber’s top markets in terms of ride volumes in India. 

“We are looking at larger enterprise clients who have significant needs for employee transportation because at scale, we will be able to unlock quite a bit of efficiency for our clients. That means we have a lot more opportunities for us to route them better by putting three or four employees in a single car,” Goud said. 

“We are looking at larger enterprise clients who have significant needs for employee transportation because at scale, we will be able to unlock quite a bit of efficiency for our clients. That means we have a lot more opportunities for us to route them better by putting three or four employees in a single car,” Goud said. 

Most of the demand for ETS comes from three types of customers: GCCs, IT companies and BPO firms. What’s common between them is their round-the-clock operations, which call for reliable commuting options for night-shift workers. Plus, they operate at a sufficiently large scale that can drive up the demand. 

As Uber plans to expand its target market, it may target companies in the manufacturing or services sectors or aim at tie-ups with IT parks or managed office space companies, according to the ETS chief. 

What’s particularly interesting is how different India is from its peer markets. While the company does have an ‘Uber for Business’ division, this is mainly focussed on demand-based point-to-point rides and doesn’t require either a dedicated fleet, or planning for scheduled and predictable commutes. 

“ETS will definitely remain one of the larger growth bets for Uber in India. With Uber’s global vision of reimagining the way the world moves for the better, we are also trying to reimagine the way that corporates move their employees for the better,” Goud said.

[Edited by Kumar Chatterjee]

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