Will Bolt’s entry shake up Zimbabwe’s ride-hailing landscape?

“Hwindi used to offer the best payouts but since Rida and InDrive came into the equation they’ve had to go lower. The apps are now more or less in the same range now…” This was one of the insights my InDrive driver shared with me on a recent trip… You see something interesting is happening in Zimbabwe. There’s a battle going on between ride-hailing companies and consumers are reaping the benefits.

The most recent entry in this space is Bolt (formerly Taxify), which is now advertising for driver sign-ups on Facebook. This comes at a time when InDrive and Rida (other recent entrants) have been pursuing hyper-aggressive marketing strategies suggesting that the competition in this space is getting tougher. 

At the moment, Bolt is only recruiting drivers in Zimbabwe but has yet to make service available to passengers. I could set up an account on the application but when trying to order a ride, I was met with an error message noting that “Bolt is not yet available here”. Nonetheless we will still explore the current state of ride-hailing in the market along with what the service potentially has to overcome if it is to enter the market…

Ride-hailing in Zimbabwe - A Brief History

Uber-like transport on-demand services aren’t new to the market. As far back as 2016 there was a battle for market share, with Rwanda’s 250Taxi (later AfriTaxi) launching 263Taxi in Zimbabwe. It never took off as local companies like GTaxi and Hwindi simply understood the market better and had been here for longer.