Uber ties up with Maruti to add more drivers

Global taxi aggregator Uber is teaming up with Maruti Suzuki to push up the number of drivers on its platform to over one million.

According to a memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed between the companies on Thursday, carmaker Maruti Suzuki will assess and train 30,000 commercial drivers for Uber, over the next three years.

The initiative, named UberSHAAN will be rolled out first in Hyderabad, Chennai and Delhi-National Capital Region. After a four-month pilot, the facility will be extended to Mumbai, Bengaluru, Ahmedabad and Pune. Driver training and on-boarding programmes will be organised, which are required to join the Uber platform.

Maruti has 370 driving schools and six institutes of driving and traffic research.

On completion of training and receipt of a commercial licence, Uber will also offer vehicle financing and leasing solutions. Uber has identified India as the next battleground, after it sold its operations to Didi Chuxing in China.

While the popular e-hailing app currently has over 400,000 driver partners, around half of that are active every month, Uber India President Amit Jain said on Thursday.

“We aim to have over a million active driver partners on our platform,” he said, at an event by industry body Federation of Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

Uber also signed a MoU with the National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) on Thursday that will allow eligible drivers to gain access to NSDC’s 158 training centres across 28 cities to get training, apart from receiving soft skills.