General Motors announces a new plan to rent cars to Uber drivers. Through General Motors’ Maven, car-sharing subsidiary company, registered Uber drivers can rent cars from Maven’s fleet for $179 per week, which includes unlimited miles and car insurance. In addition, Uber drivers can use the car for personal use when they are not working.
It is important to highlight the fact that Uber has a list of car requirements including owning a vehicle that can seat 4 or more passengers. In addition, some cities, such as New York, the car cannot be older than 5 years old, and the vehicle must pass a Uber vehicle inspection. With so many requirements, General Motors new ride sharing program allows for Uber drivers to rent a car in order to get to work.
The partnership between General Motors and Uber will start out in San Francisco, California with a fleet of Chevrolet cars including Cheverolet’s Cruze, Malibu and Trax.
This program is powered by General Motors’ car-sharing service Maven. As General Motors explains it, “Maven customers will experience seamless smartphone and keyless integration with the vehicle. Maven customers use its app to search for and reserve a vehicle by location or car type and unlock the vehicle with their smartphone.”
This is not General Motors’ first investment into the growing ride-sharing business. Earlier this year, General Motors invested half a billion dollars in the ride-sharing service Lyft. Several weeks later, General Motors announced they would rent cars to prospective Lyft drivers at a reduced cost.
Early estimates of the ride-sharing market suggest that it is growing. Researchers at the University of California, Berkley found that one out of five people are willing to use real-time ridesharing at least once a week. In order to keep up with demand, Uber announced last September a plan to give New York City Uber riders unlimited rides for $200 per month.
On Friday, Uber announced a partnership with Google to take people to their registered polling place. “Given the important decision people around the country will make on November 8th, we wanted to make getting to and from your polling place easier than ever. Teaming up with Google, Uber is excited to help make that trip as convenient and stress free as possible,” Niki Christoff, Uber’s head of federal affairs, said in a statement.
While the ride is not free, new Uber users can use the promotional code “VOTETODAY” for a $20 discount off their first ride.