Uber vs Careem, who has the upper hand in the market?

It’s has become the norm these days to witness residents of Cairo abandoning ordinary white taxies for the newly international cab brands: Uber and Careem. The main reason behind this is the very good quality a passenger enjoys thanks to using the two companies’ online transportation service. But the question remains unanswerable; who is leading the Egyptian market so far?. “Uber transformed urban mobility for millions of Egyptians when we launched in Cairo, introducing a safe, reliable and efficient way to move around the city. But Uber is more than that – we are creating valuable economic opportunities at a time when unemployment remains all too common in the Middle East. Our goal is to invest more than ever before in Egypt, providing more work as well as a better way to travel for Egyptians,” said Anthony Khoury, General Manager, Uber Egypt. The company is planning to spend around L.E 500 million within the upcoming two years as a part of its expansion strategy in the Egyptian market, so far only focused on Cairo, the capital of Egypt and its most populous and overcrowded city. On the other side of the spectrum appears Careem as a main powerful competitor with somehow higher fares but distinguished features and value proposition. Though it’s found in only 24 cities in the MENA region, Careem sounds very optimistic about their penetration of the Egyptian market, seemingly very prolific and highly promising. Careem’s technical team have enhanced maps that provide the user with location nearby unique spots to help user identify the pickup location easier also you can add comments on the pickup and drop-off location to the driver. Uber and Careem have drastically facilitated the process of transporting within the streets of Cairo. With an easy to use and download mobile app and just a simple click, you can specify where you are and where to go, contact the company, know your driver’s name and car type, select the kind of service, whether economic or prestigious and choose the payment method. The two corporations are nearly tete a tete. However, sounds like Uber is advancing towards wining a bigger market share thanks to its rapidly increasing number of drivers; A record 30,000 Cairenes, its existence in 58 countries all over the world, its huge investments in the region that reached around EGP 2.2 billion. Uber has some unique features like the ability to check the full history of your trips with payment and driver details through the mobile app and website. It provides also the advantage of having an in app help service with a technical team that uses email communication with the users, with a great response and compensation, enabling users to rate drivers from within the app. There is also the ability to split ride fare, providing, tracking service to your ride after submitting your request even if you close your app. The company provides a good experience where you can know where is the nearest ride within range of (7 to 9KM depends on day or night) and the ETA before even requesting the ride, in addition to good availability of cars.