Ground Transportation

PhocusWire's in-depth coverage of the ground transportation sector, featuring news, analysis, interviews, research and more on car rental, ride-hailing, taxis and rail.

News / Technology

Asia’s full rebound meets AI revolution: Leapfrogging into the future

By Yeoh Siew Hoon - WiT | March 26, 2025

For Schubert Lou, chief operating officer at Trip.com, 2025 marks a defining moment for the travel industry, given the full return of Asia and AI acceleration. Read More

News / Technology

Perplexity partners with Selfbook, Tripadvisor to offer hotel booking

By Morgan Hines | March 25, 2025

Users can make a natural language query for hotels with Perplexity, and the platform can then surface relevant, bookable properties based on Selfbook data and reviews from Tripadvisor. Read More

News / Online

Bolt acquires Denmark’s electric ride-hailing service Viggo

By Morgan Hines | March 24, 2025

Bolt, which was founded in 2013 and operates in 600 cities in 50 countries, already has a presence in Denmark with its e-bike rentals in Copenhagen. Read More

News / Online

Dance raises €12M for e-bike fleet expansion

By Morgan Hines | March 13, 2025

With the funding, the Berlin-based company plans to develop its software and hardware and to expand its fleet, offering e-bikes in Paris, Berlin, Hamburg and Munich. Read More

News / Online

Northeast Asia online travel bookings to break $30B by 2026

By Phocuswright Research | March 11, 2025

Northeast Asia's booking pathway is online. New demand, demographic and strategic dynamics will further reshape travel across the decade. Read More

News / Technology

Corsair Capital acquires majority share of IDnow

By Morgan Hines | March 7, 2025

IDnow, which was founded in 2014, creates artificial intelligence-powered identification verification technologies that cater to brands across sectors including the travel sector. Read More

News / Online

Travel websites littered with accessibility issues

By Morgan Hines | March 6, 2025

The 2025 Digital Accessibility Index found an average of 297 accessibility issues per webpage during Q4 of 2024 across 400,000 pages on 15,000 websites in different industries including hospitality. Read More

News / Technology

Alexa+ could earn “top-of-the-funnel” spot in travel research

By Morgan Hines | March 4, 2025

Travel brands including Tripadvisor and Uber have partnered with Amazon for the debut of its reimagined voice assistant. Read More

News / Online

Trip.com Group reports Q4 bookings growth for international and inbound travel

By Linda Fox | February 25, 2025

The China-based online travel agency said outbound bookings have recovered to 120% of pre-COVID levels. Read More

News / Technology

Snowfall announces reset, relaunches as Junction

By Andy Hoskins, BTN Europe | February 7, 2025

The company, whose difficulties have been documented in recent months, said Korelya Capital was helping to fund the relaunch, while other unspecified “existing and new investors” are also providing... Read More

Opinion / Online

How "Operator" changed the travel shopping game

By Christian Watts - Magpie | February 6, 2025

OpenAI's "Operator" has the potential to remove much of the manual work from travel search and booking as well as enable deeper research and more flexibility. Read More

News / Distribution

BlaBlaCar to lobby for fair distribution through European rail group

By Linda Fox | February 3, 2025

The organization, which also includes Omio, Kombo and Trainline as members, is seeking transparency of rail data fares and a more competitive and connected rail market for European passengers. Read More

News / Startups

Moove acquires urban mobility provider Kovi

By Morgan Hines | January 29, 2025

Moove launched in Nigeria in 2020 and is now headquarted in Dubai, with operations in 19 cities across six continents and more than 36,000 vehicles in its fleet. Read More