INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Ride-hailing giant Uber is officially relaunching in Finland today, a year after suspending its primary service in the market — when it
said it would wait for taxi laws to be deregulated.
Among the changes it was waiting for are the removal of taxi permit caps and fare
restrictions.Most parts of the Actcame into effect on July 1.
The Finnish governmentsaid its intentionis to modernize the rules to
&significantly enhance the implementation of new technology, digitalisation and new business concepts&, promoting competition and working
towards the creation of what it dubbed &seamless, multimodal travel chains& —thanks also to a push in the act for data and systems
interoperability and open interfaces.
&This Act will give us a genuine opportunity to make mobility a comprehensive service for customers,&
saidtransport minister Anne Berner last year.
From3pm CET todayUber says two services that use professional drivers — uberX and UberBLACK
— will operate in the Helsinki capital region in Finland, which it notes will includes Helsinki, Espoo, Vantaa and Kauniainen.
Uber is not
restarting its unlicensed peer-to-peer service (UberPOP) in the market.
That unlicensed driveroption has essentially been outlawed in Europe
after the region top court ruled in Decemberthat Uber is a transport service, not a platform, thereby locking its business into being
regulated by existing taxi licensing regimes.
And locking Uber into lobbying city authorities to ‘modernize& and deregulate taxi rules in
its favor — such as by removing permit caps and making it easier for more people to become taxi drivers.
&In the vast majority of the
European countries we have been operating under existing transportation laws for years now and were able to scale our business with licensed
drivers,& an Uber spokesman told us.
Blogging about the Finland relaunch, Uber talks up the different course it says it seeking to chart
under new CEO, Dara Khosrowshahi, writing: &We&ve set a course for more responsible growth with a new approach to building long-term
partnerships with cities and regulators.&
In truth Uber has had its course reset after a series of scandals rocked the company and, in
Europe, after myriad legal challenges led to regulatory blowback and ramped up public and political pressure on the company to change.
Those
external forces are continuing to reconfigure Uber business — and in Europe at least to make it better mesh with local civic values.
For
example in London, the company has made a series of changesto how it operates — such as introducingsafety caps on the hours drivers can
work— changes it made following a shock decision by the transport regulator to withdraw its license to operate in September 2017.
Last
monththe company won an appeal against TfL withdrawal of its license based on changes it had made since September 2017, though the judge
only granted it a provisional 15-month license — with UK regulators set to continue to scrutinize its conduct closely.
Another example of
Uber regional reconfiguration: An announcement in May that it would expand accident insurance cover for its drivers and delivery workers
across Europe.
Last month the company also said it will bring its Jump e-bike service to Europe — with Khosrowshahi claiming the
companywants to help cities tackle traffic-related problems such as air pollution and congestion by increasing access to &cleaner
transportation solutions&.
In Helsinki, Uber had intended to keep its UberBlack service going for the past year but a spokeswoman told us it
did not have enough drivers to provide a reliable service — so UberBlack has not been operational since the suspension
But will restart later today.
Since last August, Uber says more than 250,000 people in the Helsinki area have opened its app despite there
being no service in operation — which it touts as showing &clear demand& for its service.
It also notes that Finnish Uber users have
takenmore than 200,000 Uber trips abroad during the local market pause.
&We&re excited to use our technology to complement existing public
and private transport options and to offer an affordable, safe and reliable alternative to personal car ownership
We hope that other countries, where local people are not currently able to use apps like Uber either to get around or to make money on their
terms, will soon follow suit,& Uber adds.
