Waymo rides cost more than Uber or Lyft — and people are paying anyway

A central foundation for robotaxis is that high use and low labor spending will end it as an alternative to a cheap transport. It is still far from the truth, but now there are some data that gives us how much an idea.

OBI, an app that allows real-time pricing and combining the pick-up Times throughout multiple ride-hilling services, just just revealed it that called “K”The first depth test of the technique to determine Weemo’s price.“The company Wemor’s self-driving car has considered the comparatively more expensive than the Uber and the lift offers-and it seems not a matter.

This report, which is exclusively shared with TechCrunch, is based on a one -month valuable information collected between March 25 and April 25 in San Francisco, California. Wemo, Lift’s “Standard” offers and about 90,000 “offer” records “from Uberx to compare OBI prices and ETA. Then it compares the ride requests from the same time and from the route. OB found the lift offered the lowest average price of $ 14.44. Uber was after $ 15.58. The average value of the month throughout the valuable data of the month was $ 20.43.

OBI chief revenue officer Ashwini Anbaranjan told TechCrunch that it was a bit surprising because of the basic popularity of Wemor’s service. Wemo said in May it was supplying 250,000 TRIps given per week Its first four cities. The higher price clearly does not diminish that excitement.

“In the conversation, there is an idea that autonomous vehicles are something that will ruin the driver’s job and put drivers at risk.

In Pick Hour, the average price of OBI WiMO is about $ 11 more expensive than the lift and it seems to be about 9.50 dollars than Uber.

“I don’t hope customers will be willing to pay up to $ 10,” said Anbarajan. “I think [that] Technology, fancy and sometimes in the car without a driver speaks of the real choice for the real choice “”

OB found that Wimo was not only more expensive, but it was more variable in prices than Uber or lift.

Anbarajan said that an explanation was not as sophisticated as the value of Weemo’s value. He said that Uber and Lift kept their prices for more than a decade to start. These platforms are a bit more dynamic, drivers are clocking in their own time and joining or abandoning the outside or gig work.

Weemo, already, mostly fixed but have a slowly growing vehicle supply (though the speed of that growth May soon be accelerated) It has directed what Anbarajan has said, which is higher than the “pure supply and demand” price.

It has two major impact on the customers. A HOLD is to spend more than short travel. OB found that the WiMo rides cost about $ 26 per kilometer if the journey is below 1.4 kilometers.

It was also true for Uber and lift rides. However, the OBI found that the shortest wemo rides were priced 41.48% and 31.12% respectively than Uber and lift respectively. As the rides were longer, the gap was shrunk. A permanent ride from 1.5 km to 1.5 km, spends $ 2.60 per km per km, a Uber price is $ 2.5 per kilometer, and a wemor price cost $ 3.50 per kilometer.

The other impact is that long waiting time is equal to more expensive travel. After all, sending a car to pick a customer means it will perform less high-margins, short-distance journey.

It is not yet discouraged by Wimo customers, Anbarajan said, although OB WiMo was getting higher variables while waiting.

In addition to the data-based deep dive, OBI Los Angeles, San Francisco and Phoenix, Arizona also surveyed the riders to get a better idea of ​​what these trends are running.

The company has discovered that 70% of the users who took the Wemo ride said they had said that they had preferred a driverless car from a traditional rides or taxi.

In spite of this enthusiasm, OBI has discovered that protection is still a big concern for riders. % Of the surveyed people say 5% of the safety is their biggest concern about robotaxis. About 70% of respondents say they think that the remote human observation of the rides (something that should already be a general practice).

Perhaps the more serious thing is that people answered a question about how people would be willing to pay more for a wemo. About 40% said they would provide “the same or less”. However, 1.3.5% said they should pay less than $ 5 per journey. More than 10.1% said they would pay up to $ 5 more per ride. And 16.3% said they would pay up to $ 10 more per journey.

Anbarajan said that these reactions like these help to explain the Wemor Pricere Rides further.

He said “there is something about being in the car” that is winning the customers, he said. “It lives in a bit of bubbles for you and is available from points to points and feels very comfortable to do it”