A new transportation startup in Madison is giving riders the ability to order a taxicab with “Uber-like” convenience.
Mobile22 is an integrated ride-hailing platform licensed to traditional taxicab companies. Riders who download the startup’s app can expect many of the same features they’ve come to expect with other ride-hailing companies such as Uber and Lyft, including upfront fares, on-demand, scheduled, shared rides and live ride tracking.
Meanwhile, Mobile22 enables taxicab companies with the upgraded technology needed to facilitate payment processing, automate dispatch, and manage their drivers and fleets, allowing independent taxi providers to streamline operations and better compete against the ride-booking giants, according to the company.
Serial entrepreneur Shree Kalluri is behind the startup, which officially launched in October with the announcement of its first regional partnership, Green Cab of Madison.
Kalluri said the taxicab industry has taken a hit as ride-hailing companies have crowded the market, in addition to the pandemic undermining ride demand. Still, Kalluri said he was motivated to push his idea Mobile22 forward.
“It’s a 360-degree view of everything you need for a cab company,” Kalluri said. “If we can help (the taxi companies) become better companies, we can allow them to bounce back and be more sustainable. There is a lot of need for these providers.”
The tech entrepreneur said he also wanted to contribute to a greater cause – climate change.
In 2017, Kalluri found himself mulling over ideas to reduce carbon emissions. He began to focus on the connection between shared rideability and zero-emission vehicles, and how combining the two might generate more positive impact.
While he credits companies like Uber for bringing technology to an outdated industry, he says there were drawbacks. Ride-hailing company drivers bring an unlimited number of vehicles to the road and drive wages down. There’s surge pricing. And there’s less control over local regulations, such as cleaning or fares, he says.
“They flooded the cities with a lot more drivers than needed,” Kalluri explains. “Another part is, because they have so many drivers they weren’t making enough money. That’s all the darker side of the Uber, Lyft dominance. There’s more control with private companies.”
Around the same time in 2017, Kalluri sold his Tesla and was facing a four-month gap as he awaited a new model. He decided to use the time to “test his hypotheses” by becoming a commuter who solely relied on taking an Uber or taxicab to work each day. He wanted to understand riders’ experiences and explore the challenges of taxi operators.
At the end of his experiment, Kalluri decided to acquire Green Cab, an all-electric taxi provider, and build a technology platform to rival other ride-hailing companies. He began developing the tech last July.
“Once I get an idea and am certain in my mind, I go guns blazing,” Kalluri said. “The future of transportation is multimodal and multiplayer. It’s not just going to be Uber that owns it all. There is a lot of need for all of these providers. (Mobile22) allows us to create an ecosystem that is more collaborative — for the drivers, and (to provide) more options for the drivers.”
Prior to its partnership with Mobile22, Green Cab was struggling to meet those needs with its in-house software tools, the taxi company said in a press release.
“Our dispatch team often spent a lot of time during peak hours trying to get our cabs to our customers,” said Ram Venkatesh, president of Green Cab. “And it became a challenge to give immediate fare estimates to customers. These issues added up, and it meant that we couldn’t offer the high level customer experience we wanted to provide.”
In April, Kalluri acquired Badger Cab and folded it under the Green Cab brand. Currently, the company operates 55 all-electric cabs, including its fleet of Teslas and Chevy Bolts, all enabled by the Mobile22 platform.
Kalluri’s initial goal was to use Green Cab as the “blueprint” to show other taxi companies how to compete and scale, but he soon realized not everyone could afford an all-electric fleet — or the endless funds to invest in upgraded tech. That’s when he spun off Mobile22 for licensing.
“You can be on our platform right away and when you’re ready you can get the electric vehicles,” he said.
To date, Kalluri has raised nearly $5 million from angel investors and is in talks with several cab companies across the country to subscribe to his technology. It hasn’t been easy to raise capital in the current environment, he said, and he's had to personally invest more than intended, something that was made slightly easier after successfully exiting his health care tech startup, last year.
Kalluri says the next six months will be pivotal to Mobile22, but he remains optimistic about the future of shared rideability and creating community sustainability. Riders can download the Mobile22 app from the Apple App store or request rides using the company’s web app.
“As a startup you have so many challenges,” Kalluri said. “At the end of the day, it’s really about developing a great product. We are weathering the storm. When business is booming, we’ll be ready.”
