SINGAPORE: The merger of Strides and Premier reflects the challenges smaller taxi operators face amid the decline of the industry and the rise of ride-hailing, transport analysts told CNA on Thursday .
In 2022, point-to-point transport trips recovered to 80 per cent of pre-pandemic levels, Senior Minister of State for Transport Amy Khor said in parliament in March. “This kind of consolidation makes more sense than, for example, SMRT just choosing to buy a couple thousand more taxis itself. Because if you do that, you’re going to compound the potential problem of oversupply. It makes more sense to just absorb a smaller competitor,” he said.
“But I think many of these smaller players never really were able to achieve a scale that would make a lot of sense in terms of the operations, being able to economise the cost and so on.” Echoing his sentiments, Associate Professor Raymond Ong from the National University of Singapore said it would be challenging for smaller companies today as ride-hailing has “a much larger market share” compared with traditional taxi companies today.
Likewise, Assoc Prof Theseira believes the market impact for commuters is “pretty much zero”, because the move doesn’t change the total fleet size in the taxi industry.
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