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Didi Chuxing China Uber

Uber predicts it will steamroll native Didi Chuxing to become China’s top taxi app

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By John McCarthy, Opinion Editor

June 3, 2016 | 2 min read

Despite only operating in China since 2014, Uber thinks it has what it takes to become the country’s top taxi app in the next year.

China

To do so, it will have to outpace and outperform native service Didi Chuxing, which was formed in 2015 when two ride-on-demand competitors merged to combat the US invader.

While Didi is backed by some of China’s largest companies, including Alibaba and Tencent, Uber has around an $11bn war chest and has shown it is not afraid to invest billions in the booming Chinese market.

Zhen Liu, senior vice president of strategy at Uber China, said, according to Tech Crunch: “Last year, we were only operating in eight cities and we were [at] about one per cent marketshare. A year later, we are about one-third of the marketshare and operating in over 60 cities across China.

He claimed that in the next year, the company would over surpass Didi’s overall market share, despite starting from nothing not so long ago.

Liu concluded: “There’s lot of competition in the ride-sharing market, that’s true [but] what we are really doing is to focus on what’s in front of us. It’s like running a hurdles race, if you want to win a hurdles race the only thing you need to focus on is what’s in front of you.

"You don’t really look over your shoulder to see what other athletes are doing.”

On the other side of the coin, Didi looks to threaten Uber on its own turf, having secretly invested in its rival Lyft last year.

Didi Chuxing China Uber

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