China’s Ride-Hailing Didi Chuxing Debuts Russia Service

Didi Chuxing, the Chinese ride-hailing service, has launched in Russia as the company’s first Eurasian market, a blog post on the company website announced.

DiDi Express has launched in Kazan, the capital and largest city in the Republic of Tatarstan. Tatarstan is home to the largest IT park in Russia, according to the post. DiDi Russia will now try to provide drivers with competitive transparent service fee structures. And for riders, the company will aim to provide safe, inexpensive rides and convenient services to get from place to place.

Driver recruitment began in July, the blog post stated.

Stephen Zhu, senior vice president and head of DiDi’s international business, said the company is looking forward to its new expansion.

“We look forward to building a broad partnership with Russian fleet partners and drivers to providing better, safer and more convenient services to the public,” he said, according to the post. “We are deeply inspired by the resilience of cities and the effective anti-COVID work of all dedicated DiDi teams and partners around the world. This experience is invaluable as we pursue new opportunities and support communities in rebuilding their economy with better and safer transportation services.”

Elsewhere in the Russian ridesharing world, Yandex could be looking to buy out Uber‘s share of the company that the two co-own in the country. The initial plan was to launch an initial public offering (IPO), but Yandex could drop that plan, PYMNTS reported.

Instead, Yandex could look to buy the 38 percent stake Uber owns in the company, which was valued $1.24 billion as of March 31, although nothing has been decided yet.

Uber owns part of Yandex, along with other such companies like Grab, Zomato and DiDi.

Yandex makes most of its money through web advertising, but it has also operated a ride-hailing service since 2011.

Didi Chuxing also announced last year that it would be rolling out a robo-taxi service in Shanghai.