HerRyde, a woman-only ride-hailing company has launched operations in Abuja Nigeria.
According to the company’s CEO Monsurah Oluwafuyi, COO Muhammad Muazu, and Chief Product Officer Kamaldeen Ibrahim, the company aims to provide a safer option for female drivers and riders and also create employment opportunities for more women.
“HerRyde is committed to women’s safety and inclusion in the ride-hailing/mobility space. We aim to provide women with safer taxi experiences while driving inclusion by providing a safe space for women to work and earn as mobility entrepreneurs.”
The move follows a collective desire to change the reality that too many women get harassed and abused on ride-hailing trips. Social media platforms are often rife with tales of physical assault, sexual assault, and robbery suffered by women while on rides.
HerRyde’s Chief Product Officer, Kamaldeen Ibrahim, told TechCabal that the company chose to launch in Abuja because of Abuja’s lower barrier to entry compared to Lagos, which demands numerous licences from drivers and ride-hailing apps.
Women-only ride-hailing platforms are on the rise across the world. For example In Saudi Arabia, Uber launched the feature for female drivers, which provides them with a choice in selecting a preference to be connected to women riders. Bolt, has also adopted a women-only feature on its platform which is currently active in five countries across the globe
More ride-hailing companies are now beginning to include women-centered services to ensure their safety, which is a great development. In a 2019 study on women-only ride-hailing platforms, researchers from the UCLA Anderson School of Management and Hong Kong Polytechnic discovered that because there is a smaller pool of drivers available, these services are typically more expensive and of lower quality.
In response to these potential challenges of cost and quality, the three co-founders said that the company will determine fares the same way Uber and Bolt do, based on time and distance, instead of using InDriver’s approach, a ride-hailing platform that allows users to negotiate their final fare.