Technology provider rideOS is launching a new platform which allows transportation and related organisations to create and manage their own ride-hailing networks.

The Ridehail Platform, which includes a Ridehail API and open-source mobile apps, claims to be the only routing and dispatching product that is “base-map agnostic” and compatible with both human-driven and autonomous vehicles.

It also claims that it is the first time a set of ride-hailing applications have been open-sourced, allowing customers to easily rebrand or build new features on top of these new applications.

Simplifying ride-hailing

The Ridehail API is available as a standalone backend API, or through new open-source driver and rider apps for iOS and Android.

“Starting and maintaining a ride-hailing network is unnecessarily complex. The plumbing it takes behind the scenes to route, dispatch and optimise a high-quality, ride-hailing experience is tricky to build and time-consuming to maintain,” said Chris Blumenberg, rideOS chief technology officer and co-founder.

“Our Ridehail API takes care of this plumbing, so autonomous companies and OEMs don’t have to, saving them time and money so they can get to market faster.”

The platform offers customers the flexibility to choose from a variety of integration points across the technology stack:

• open-Source apps to quickly deploy fleets with virtually no integration time. Customers can easily rebrand the app by inserting their logo and swapping in their desired color palette;
• Ridehail API to efficiently match riders with vehicles and manage trip state. This is the fastest way to incorporate all of rideOS’ underlying optimisation and routing services into any customer’s existing app;
• fleet planner API to build dynamic and optimal plans for fleets of vehicles including single rider and carpooling rides. This sophisticated optimisation service is ideal for companies who already have basic dispatching services in an existing app, but would like to offer pooled trips or improve their fleet efficiency;
• routing API to get routes and accurate estimated times of arrival based on traffic conditions and the unique constraints of a given vehicle. The rideOS routing engine was specifically designed with AVs in mind but is also compatible with human-driven vehicles. It offers customers the ability to define keep-out zones and restrict certain maneuvers based on the capabilities of their autonomous vehicle.

New rideOS partners making use of the Ridehail platform include Voyage, which is deploying it across its fleet of self-driving cars, and Here, which has integrated its Mobile SDKs and Open Location platform with it, to provide a seamless experience for existing Here customers to utilise rideOS services.

“The plumbing it takes behind the scenes to route, dispatch and optimise a high-quality, ride-hailing experience is tricky to build and time-consuming to maintain”

“We are thrilled to pair our Open Location platform with rideOS’ Ridehail platform and are fully committed to supporting their mission to accelerate the safe, global roll-out of next-generation transport,” said senior vice president and general manager of the Americas at Here, Kirk Mitchell.

“An autonomous world requires a level of accuracy and freshness that is orders of magnitude more than what had been traditionally accepted in ride-hailing and dispatch. Together with rideOS, we are excited about redefining what a transportation platform can do as we prepare for the advent of full autonomy.”

In the near future, the company expects to offer similar products for other use cases such as goods delivery, logistics, and industrial robotics.

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