Global Distribution Systems for the Taxi_PHV Industry

DMS Platforms
Buyers on our platform are powerful brands which want to natively embed mobility into
their own websites and apps; Karhoo has developed connectors with their User Identity
Management and Loyalty Programme systems, which allow for example to earn and
burn loyalty points with mobility services. It creates a win-win situation for our partners:
brands enhance the customer experience with seamless mobility and fleet operators
have more opportunities to sell their service.
On top of “translating” individual DMS interfaces into a unique demand-side interface
that Demand Partners can use, Karhoo is providing useful services to DMS and fleets:
• Protection against high request volumes with low quote-to-booking rates through
Machine Learning quote predictions, using DMS resources only for requests that have
the best chances of converting.
• Location and address enrichment, a software layer using reverse geocoding that
is able to normalise any address and local common points of interests to lower
processing costs and reduce the issue of ambiguous pickup locations.
• Settlement orchestration, providing consolidated and detailed reports on rides per
distribution channel (Demand Partner) and safely organising the financial flows in
multiple currencies.
• Management tools using AI technologies to proactively spot any outliers and possibly
automatically correct it too, hence reducing the amount of billing errors to be
corrected manually.
New data-driven distribution strategies
When Global Distribution Systems come to represent a third of transactions in the Taxi/
PHV industry, similar to what is happening in other industries, participating operators
will need to learn how to best position their offering to maximise sales using pricing,
differentiating propositions and evidence of passenger satisfaction.
Fortunately there are many books on how to sell on digital marketplaces, listing best
practices for retail that will also be applicable to mobility. For instance, in retail, shipping
costs and return policies make a difference; in mobility, extras like waiting time charge
and cancellation fees may play a similar role.
One of the important benefits of working with a marketplace is that it delivers tons of
data. Here are a few examples on how data will help optimise business performance:
• Identify geographical zones or time periods when supply does not match demand on
a regular basis, leading to new opportunities of business,
• Understand where and when competition is getting a greater share of the markets
where you operate, even with a fine granularity, so you can decide on whether to
compete or retreat,
• Benchmark or augment your own data with overall market metrics coming from the
marketplace to increase the reliability of your analysis and make sure you operate with
the right service, pricing strategy and financial performance.
Important note: Karhoo will never share any personal passenger or driver data
between marketplace partners, just aggregated market data.
Global Distribution Systems for the Taxi/PHV Industry 5