Dubai Taxi plans to expand services to other emirates
The publicly-listed Dubai Taxi Company (DTC), which is already a major player in the ride-hailing platform sector across Dubai, should also expand into operating taxis and limousines in other emirates, the company's CEO said on the sidelines of the World Governments Summit in Dubai on Tuesday.
“We believe that we’re entering new markets. Currently, we are just catering taxis and limousines in Dubai. However we are conducting a study to determine how we can extend our operations (to other emirates)," DTC CEO Mansoor Rahma Alfalasi said.
DTC was established in 1994 and became a public shareholding company in 2023. The company now has over 9,000 vehicles – 6000 of them taxis – and employs 17,500 drivers across four main businesses; taxis, VIP limousines, buses and deliveries.
DTC has previously diversified with a deal inked in December last year with global e-hailing platform Bolt that offered mainly limousine services. Alfalasi told Standard that normal taxi services can be launched on Bolt this first quarter this year.
Alfalasi said Bolt is also known as the “largest e-hailing app in the world with 200 million active users in over 600 cities and over 50 countries.”
He further said, “If Bolt wants to expand in the UAE and other places around the region and they want us to be a partner, we are happy to do so, Expansion is not only across the board in terms of business verticals but also inclusive of other business verticals such as micro-mobility solutions such e-scooter and e-bike rentals, e-food and grocery delivery, and the short-term car rental.”
In Abu Dubai, DTC is already operating bikes with Talabat, Alfalasi said. DTC also operates school buses with few exceptions in Ras Al Khaimah and Ajman.
He added: "We will make an announcement if we are going to extend the taxi business into other emirates.
In addition, Alfalasi also mentioned that the autonomous taxis are expected to hit the Dubai roads by 2026. Even in September 2023, fully-automated self-driving taxis have been launched, after mapping the Jumeirah 1 area. This will make Dubai — in addition to be the first place to globally push the full operation of driverless taxi and e-hail services outside of US — globally the first city to commercially operate Cruise self-driving vehicles outside the US.
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