Uber rival Ola to stop all Australian, New Zealand rideshare services this week

Rideshare company Ola, one of the biggest competitors to Uber, is shutting down operations across Australia and New Zealand this week.

In an email understood to have been sent to users across Australia and New Zealand — including in Sydney, Perth and Auckland — Ola said it would “discontinue operations” from April 12.

“This means that you will no longer be able to book any rides through your Ola app from that date,” the email said.

“You must not take any rides with any vehicle purporting to be an Ola vehicle or Ola driver from 12th April 2024. Ola has not authorised any driver or any other party to use the Ola brand or provide rides on Ola’s behalf.”

The email did not reveal why it was scaling back operations. An Ola ANZ customer care representative later confirmed the shut down after The West Australian contacted Ola for comment via its support services contact.

“We regret to inform you that Ola has decided to no longer operate in Australia and New Zealand,” she said.

Customers are still able to access account information from the Ola app and raise any queries or issues to its customer care team for a period of 30 days until May 11, before being permanently locked out.

The University of Western Australia business school senior lecturer Caleb Goods said rideshare was a hyper-competitive industry.

Dr Goods, who focuses on gig work like rideshare and food delivery, said Ola was competing with other players like Uber and DiDi as well as the traditional taxi industry.

“(Ola) has been in Australia for five or so years, their strategy is to grow market share and then hope to become profitable and it never really cracked it,” he said.

“Uber, in terms of rideshare, is still the dominant player in the Australian market and both Ola and DiDi have just really struggled to get much beyond 15 per cent to 20 per cent of the market.”

Ola drivers have also been sent an email urging them to download all relevant information for tax and business purposes before the app becomes unavailable on May 11.

Ola on its website boasts as being one of the world’s largest ridesharing companies, operating in Australia, New Zealand, the UK and India.

It claims to have a global user base of 150 million customers and one million drivers across more than 125 cities.

In Australia, Ola is available to riders in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, the Gold Coast, Adelaide, Canberra and Perth. Ola also operates in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch.

Ola was founded by Bhavish Aggarwal and Ankit Bhati in India in 2011, with the rideshare company launching in Australia in 2018.

“We are very excited about launching Ola in Australia and see immense potential for the ride-sharing ecosystem which embraces new technology and innovation,” Mr Aggarwal said at the time of its launch in Australia.

Dr Goods is not expecting “a big shift in availability” of rideshare.

“Someone using the Ola app is usually using the Uber and DiDi apps as well,” he said.