Type | Private company |
---|---|
Industry | Vehicle for hire, Sharing economy |
Founded | London, United Kingdom February 27, 2014 |
Founders |
|
Headquarters | , |
Products | Mobile app, Fashion accessory |
Website | haxiapp |
Original author(s) | Joonas Kirsebom, Simon Lund |
---|---|
Initial release | 16 February 2014 [1] |
Stable release | 1.12 / 11 July 2016 |
Written in | Java, Objective-C |
Operating system | Android, iOS |
Platform | Web, Android, iOS |
Size | 2.84 MB |
Available in | 5 languages |
List of languages English, Spanish, Swedish, Norwegian, Danish | |
Type | App, instant messaging, Vehicle for hire, transportation |
Website | haxiapp |
Haxi (stylized as HAXI) is a vehicle for hire company that enables users to share transport over short and mid range distances. The name is a portmanteau of "hack" and "taxi". Registered users can be drivers, passengers, or both. Drivers active for more than three days per month need an access pass or a subscription plan. Unregistered users cannot get contact details on other users. No registration is needed to logon. The firm's mobile application facilitates transportation by enabling passengers who need a ride to request one from available "community drivers."
Haxi was incorporated by Aleksander Soender, Joonas Kirsebom and Robert Daniel Nagy in February 2014. The service was launched as a web app in Stavanger, Norway December 2013. Applications for Android and iPhone was released in March 2014. Haxi is available in English, Spanish, Norwegian, Swedish and Danish. The company is based in London, Great Britain. Angel investor funding for Haxi was secured in June 2014. [2] [3]
Since December 2013, [4] Haxi has grown to the biggest ridesharing network in Norway. In June 2014, it was estimated that 11,000 Norwegians were using Haxi. [5] By August 2014, that number has risen to 31,000 users with over 2,000 registered drivers in Norway alone. [6]
In September 2014, Haxi surpassed 3,000 registered drivers, and has 42,000 users, with 72% using the app more than once. At this growth rate, Haxi is expected to become bigger than the whole Norwegian taxi force combined by December 2014. [7] [8] Haxi is mentioned as one of the most interesting companies in the ridesharing market Worldwide. [9] [10] In June 2014, Norwegian Taxi Association CEO, Lars Hjelmeng, estimated that ridesharing via Haxi and social media is generating up to one billion NOK (Norwegian Krone) annually. [11] In March 2017 the total number of active drivers on Haxi passed the 10.000 mark in Scandinavia. [12]
The HaxiStar - Explorer Version is an electronic roof top sign and light designed by Lars Holme Larsen from Kilo Design in collaboration with Haxi. [13] The lightning device is inspired by a mix of the traditional taxi top sign and gadgets like the Little Tree/Wunderbaum air freshener. It has multiple placement options; roof, dashboard, and rear mirror. The light is controlled by a simple remote control with two settings; pulsing for waiting and steady light for available. HaxiStar was tested among drivers in Norway and Denmark throughout 2016. Haxi drivers with a subscription plan get the HaxiStar device for free. [14]
Haxi operates under a freemium business model (basic services are free, while additional features for drivers are offered via access passes and paid subscriptions). Haxi makes its revenues by selling access passes and subscriptions to drivers.
Paid products are currently only active within selected geographical areas.
As of February 2018, the three Haxi access passes and subscription types, all offering unlimited access, are:
Products | Network access | Type |
---|---|---|
Free | 3 days/month | Freemium |
24hrs | 24 hours + 3 days | Access pass |
48hrs | 48 hours + 3 days | Access pass |
Monthly | Unlimited access | Subscription |
Since Haxi officially launched in December 2013, there has been much media attention on the topic of illegal taxicab operation in the Norwegian press. [15] [16] [17] [18] [19]
On March 9, 2014, local taxi drivers drove two students from Stavanger to Copenhagen for free as a protest against Haxi. [20]
On August 28, 2014, the Norwegian Taxi Association and taxi operator I-taxi notified the police about a Haxi user for unlicensed taxi operation. The case was later dropped by the police in Grimstad. [21]
On October 7, 2014, the Norwegian Transport Worker Association notified the police in Oslo about Haxi for operating an unlicensed taxi operation. [22] [23] A week later, on October 13, 2014, the police in Oslo informed the Norwegian Transport Worker Association that the case against Haxi was dropped. [24]
From September to November 2014, undercover agents from Stavanger Police booked several rides from Haxi drivers. In December 2014, investigators began to interview drivers and fine them for 8.000 NOK and three months confiscation of the car for breaking the Yrketransportlov. [25] On December 17, 2014, Stavanger Police published a press release saying 3 of 8 Haxi users were official taxi drivers using the service for spontaneous ridesharing. [26] Haxi advised all drivers to decline the fine and offered all drivers financial and legal support to test the case in court. Three Haxi drivers accepted this offer from Haxi and declined to pay the fines. [27]
On May 11, 2015, the trial started against three drivers from the Haxi community in the Stavanger District Court (Tingrett). The three drivers were granted legal aid by the judge because of the principle which is rare in administrative law cases. [28] Main discussion points between the prosecutor, police lawyer, Stian Eskeland and the defendant Torbjørn Kolås Sognefest from Advokatfirmaet Elden were police entrapment, the taxi law Yrketransportloven, double jeopardy, and the definition of public space. [29]
On May 20, 2015, the three Haxi drivers accused of breaking the Norwegian taxi law Yrketransportloven were acquitted by three concurring judges in the Stavanger District Court. [30] Stavanger Police lost the case against the three Haxi drivers because prosecutor Stian Eskeland could not convince the judges that the Haxi app was part of public space. Spontaneous ridesharing via Haxi was announced legal in local media. [31] [32]
On June 2, 2015, the prosecutor Stian Eskeland from the Stavanger Police announced that they have appealed the acquittal of the three Haxi drivers to the Gulating Court of Appeal (Lagmannsrett). [33] [34]
On February 11, 2016, the appeal trial started in the Gulating Court of Appeal in Stavanger Norway against the three Haxi drivers who were acquitted by the Stavanger District Court in May 2015. [35]
On February 15, 2016, the three Haxi drivers were acquitted by the seven concurring judges in Gulating Court of Appeal. [36]
February 29, 2016, Stavanger Police announced the case was appealed for the Supreme Court of Norway. [37] on April 5, 2016, the Supreme Court of Norway accepted the appeal by the Norwegian Prosecuting Authority. [38]
In June 2016, The Supreme Court of Norway ruled that the Haxi app could not be considered a "public place", and that thus, using Haxi cannot be considered illegal based on the transport law that prohibits offering person transport on a public place. [39]
In June 2017, the three drivers received compensation for unjustified prosecution from Statens Sivilrettsforvaltning [40]
In June 2014, Haxi drivers started appearing in Denmark. [41] On the July 10, 2014, the Danish Transport Authority notified the police about Haxi for operating an unlicensed taxi service. [42] [43]
On July 29, 2014, Haxi requested the Danish Transport Authority to revoke the note to the police. [44]
March 21, 2016, Danish Police announced all Haxi investigations were cancelled. [45] [46]
Carpooling is the sharing of car journeys so that more than one person travels in a car, and prevents the need for others to have to drive to a location themselves.
Uber Technologies, Inc. provides ride-hailing services, food delivery, and freight transport. It is headquartered in San Francisco and operates in approximately 70 countries and 10,500 cities worldwide. The company has over 131 million monthly active users and 6 million active drivers and couriers worldwide and facilitates an average of 25 million trips per day. It has facilitated 42 billion trips since its inception in 2010 and is the largest ridesharing company in the United States.
Knut Arild Hareide is a Norwegian politician who served as a member of parliament from Hordaland and as the leader of the Christian Democratic Party from 2011 to 2019. He served as Minister of Transport and Communications from 2020 to 2021, and as Minister of the Environment from 2004 to 2005 in the second Bondevik cabinet. In 2007, he announced he would step down from the national political scene for the time being, but he returned when he was nominated as the top candidate for the Christian Democratic Party ticket in Akershus in the 2009 election where he won the county's leveling seat. After Dagfinn Høybråten stepped down as party leader, Hareide was unanimously elected to take his place at the 2011 party convention. In the 2013 election, Hareide was reelected to parliament, this time from his home county of Hordaland.
Boda bodas are bicycles and motorcycle taxis commonly found in East Africa. While motorcycle taxis like boda bodas are present throughout Africa and beyond, the term boda boda is specific to East Africa. In Kenya, they are more frequently called piki pikis. Their ubiquitous presence in East African cities is the result of a number of factors including an increasing demand for public transit, the ability to purchase motorcycles on credit, and an influx of cheap imports from Indian manufacturers like Bajaj and high level of unemployment among the youth. In the countries where they are present, boda bodas can provide transportation options to riders and job opportunities to drivers while at the same time resulting in an increase in road hazards and collisions and unnecessary injuries and deaths.
In New York City, taxicabs come in two varieties: yellow and green; they are widely recognizable symbols of the city. Taxis painted yellow are able to pick up passengers anywhere in the five boroughs. Those painted apple green, which began to appear in August 2013, are allowed to pick up passengers in Upper Manhattan, the Bronx, Brooklyn, Queens, and Staten Island. Both types have the same fare structure. Taxicabs are operated by private companies and licensed by the New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission (TLC). It also oversees over 40,000 other for-hire vehicles, including "black cars", commuter vans, and ambulettes.
Taxis of Singapore come in two main varieties. Traditional taxi companies offer flag down and call bookings and their drivers are hired employees of the company. Ridesharing companies allow bookings through a smartphone, allowing ease for passengers, these are mostly known as private hire vehicles (PHV). Their apps also allow the flexibility to work and pick up passengers with their own vehicle, be it owned or rented, provided the various requirements are met depending on the company.
The Gulating Court of Appeal is one of six courts of appeal in the Kingdom of Norway. The Court is located in the city of Bergen. The court has jurisdiction over the counties of Vestland and Rogaland plus Sirdal Municipality in Agder county. These areas constitute the Gulating judicial district. This court can rule on both civil and criminal cases that are appealed from one of its subordinate district courts. Court decisions can be, to a limited extent, appealed to the Supreme Court of Norway. There are 33 permanent judges seated on this court. The chief judicial officer of the court is currently Magni Elsheim. The court is administered by the Norwegian National Courts Administration.
Lyft, Inc. is an American company offering mobility as a service, ride-hailing, vehicles for hire, motorized scooters, a bicycle-sharing system, rental cars, and food delivery in the United States and select cities in Canada. Lyft sets fares, which vary using a dynamic pricing model based on local supply and demand at the time of the booking and are quoted to the customer in advance, and receives a commission from each booking. Lyft is the second-largest ridesharing company in the United States after Uber.
Shared transport or shared mobility is a transportation system where travelers share a vehicle either simultaneously as a group or over time as personal rental, and in the process share the cost of the journey, thus creating a hybrid between private vehicle use and mass or public transport. It is a transportation strategy that allows users to access transportation services on an as-needed basis. Shared mobility is an umbrella term that encompasses a variety of transportation modes including carsharing, Bicycle-sharing systems, ridesharing companies, carpools, and microtransit.
A ridesharing company is a company that, via websites and mobile apps, matches passengers with drivers of vehicles for hire that, unlike taxis, cannot legally be hailed from the street.
Tina Bru is a Norwegian politician for the Conservative Party. From 2020 to 2021, she served as the Minister of Petroleum and Energy. She was elected to the Storting from Rogaland in 2013 and became a member of the Standing Committee on Energy and the Environment. She was reelected to the Storting for the period 2017–2021, and continued as a member of the Standing Committee on Energy and the Environment.
Ola Cabs is an Indian multinational ridesharing company, headquartered in Bangalore. It also operates in other business verticals including financial services and cloud kitchens.
The legality of ridesharing companies by jurisdiction varies; in some areas they are considered to be illegal taxi operations, while in other areas, they are subject to regulations that can include requirements for driver background checks, fares, caps on the number of drivers in an area, insurance, licensing, and minimum wage.
Loai Mohammed Deeb is a Palestinian who is the leader of Global Network for Rights and Development (GNRD) and a former member of the municipal council of Sola, Norway.
Grab Holdings Inc. is a Singaporean multinational technology company headquartered in One-North, Singapore. It is the developer of a super-app for ride-hailing, food delivery and digital payments services on mobile devices that operates in Singapore, Malaysia, Cambodia, Indonesia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam.
Mobility as a service (MaaS) is a type of service that, through a joint digital channel, enables users to plan, book, and pay for multiple types of mobility services. The concept describes a shift away from personally-owned modes of transportation and towards mobility provided as a service. This is enabled by combining transportation services from public and private transportation providers through a unified gateway that creates and manages the trip, which users can pay for with a single account. Users can pay per trip or a monthly fee for a limited distance. The key concept behind MaaS is to offer travelers mobility solutions based on their travel needs.
Didi Chuxing Technology Co., formerly named Didi Dache (嘀嘀打车) and Didi Kuaidi, is a Chinese vehicle for hire company headquartered in Beijing with over 550 million users and tens of millions of drivers. The company provides app-based transportation services, including taxi hailing, private car hailing, social ride-sharing, and bike sharing; on-demand delivery services; and automobile services, including sales, leasing, financing, maintenance, fleet operation, electric vehicle charging, and co-development of vehicles with automakers. The company is a subsidiary of Xiaoju Kuaizhi Inc.
Yandex Taxi is an international company operating taxi hailing and food delivery services across Russia, the CIS, Eastern Europe, Africa, and the Middle East. It is owned by Russian tech company Yandex. The company is among the world's leading developers of self-driving technology.
Cabify is a multi-mobility platform for people and objects that offers various alternatives to reduce urban travel in private cars. The company operates in Spain and Latin America. Between 2016 and 2019, it also operated in Portugal - where it was available in Lisbon and Porto - and between 2016 and 2021 in Brazil.
inDrive, is an international ride-hailing service with more than 150 million downloads operating in 48 countries. Headquartered in Mountain View, California, it is the second largest ridesharing and taxi app worldwide by downloads. The company was officially launched in 2013.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link){{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link){{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)