Two of SoftBank funded cab booking services: Ola and South East Asia-based GrabTaxi are in talks for a global taxi alliance to take on rival Uber, reports BuzzFeed. It says the alliance is being driven by SoftBank Capital and San-Francisco-based Flywheel is also part of these discussions with Flywheel CFO Oneal Bhambani and Flywheel CEO Rakesh Mathur discussing specifics with Ola CEO Bhavish Aggarwal. GrabTaxi's CEO Brian Cu told BuzzFeed that this alliance would include knowledge sharing and possibly cross-booking i.e. you can book a GrabTaxi cab from GrabTaxi using Ola's mobile app and vice versa. SoftBank Capital and Ola Cabs declined to comment on this to the publication. It's worth noting that SoftBank had invested (pdf) $250 million in GrabTaxi last month and had also led a $210 million investment in Ola in October last year. Meanwhile, Uber had also raised $1.2 billion at a valuation of $40 billion from Qatar Investment Authority, hedge funds Valiant Capital Partners & Lone Pine Capital, and VC firm New Enterprise Associates last month. Implications Travelers abroad might find these partnerships useful as it avoids downloading multiple applications when they are in a new city and help them use the local cab-hailing services there, given that Uber is available across markets. In addition to integrated apps and information sharing, the companies could also share revenues when a cab is booked internationally on their apps. Recent Ola Cabs related developments - Ola in November, piloted a new service in Bangalore which allowed users to book auto rickshaw rides in the city. In October, it also allowed Mumbaikars…
