Tnooz, Martin Cowen - The scale of Uber‘s challenge in China has been put into context by some official numbers released by its main rival and market leader Didi Kuaidi.
Didi rarely shares any authenticated business metrics. Its release came out a few hours after Uber announced an investment and co-operation deal with China’s HNA Group, although the timing of Didi’s announcement is likely to be co-incidental rather than reactive.
In terms of market share, it is widely known that Didi is dominant, and the release refers to China Internet Network Information Center research which gives Didi an 87.2% share of China’s private car hailing market.
The volumes are less well known. Didi says it completed 1.43 billion rides across its entire business in 2015. It puts this in context by saying this number is “1.4 times Uber’s global rides in the past six years since its launch in 2009.”
And in December alone it completed 200 million rides, which it says is more than the yearly total for taxi rides in New York.
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