Meru Cabs plans overseas foray

Having cornered close to a 50 per cent market share in India, radio cab service provider Meru Cabs plans to venture overseas by the end of this year.

“We have about 50 per cent share in the domestic market. We think this is the right time to enter the global market,” Meru Cabs Chief Executive Mr Rajesh Puri told PTI here.

“We are in talks with the Governments of three-four countries and plan to start our operations by 2011-end,” he said. Mr Puri, however, did not identify the markets the company plans to enter.

Ramp up operations

The country's largest radio cab service provider wants to ramp up its operations by adding 2,000 cars and hiring an equal number of drivers by 2011-end to meet consumer demand.

“We plan to add 2,000 cabs at an investment of around Rs 200 crore by December, 2011, to cater to customer demand,” he said, adding that the company also plans to recruit an equal number of drivers by the year-end.

At present, Meru has 5,300 cars and 5,000 drivers pan-India.

It receives around 5,000 requests for cab bookings on a single day across Mumbai, Delhi, Bangalore and Hyderabad.

“We receive around 15 lakh requests every month,” Mr Puri said, adding, “During peak hours, the company finds itself rejecting nearly 40 per cent requests.”

Mr Puri said Sistema Shyam Teleservices (SSTL), which offers mobile phone services under the MTS brand, has partnered with Meru to offer free Internet services to its passengers in New Delhi and Mumbai.

“The company is likely to soon launch similar services in other major towns as well,” he said.

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