- General
- June 18, 2018
- 3 minutes read
Uber booking feature removed from Google Maps on Android platform
image credit : Flickr/ Núcleo Editorial In a recently spotted functionality move, Google maps which notably allowed Uber rides to be…
image credit : Flickr/ Núcleo Editorial
In a recently spotted functionality move, Google maps which notably allowed Uber rides to be booked from inside the app without the need of going to the Uber app itself has now stopped this collaborative feature for currently unknown reasons.
Right now, Users will still be able to get estimated transportation costs between destinations but will have to go to the Uber app itself to hail a ride for their journey. This feature was also previously present on Google Maps’ iOS app before being removed sometime last summer.
As the reason for the removal is unknown, It can be speculated that this may be due to the recent $1 Billion Google’s parent company Alphabet made in Uber’s major U.S. competitor Lyft and in an effort to avoid conflict of interest while providing direct access to Uber or that Uber as of now prefer its users go directly through its app to hail rides to their destinations.
As the reason is yet unclear, Uber now maintains the same functionality level as other ride hailing apps including Lyft, Gett and a slew of others on the Google Maps app.
The feature which was added last year January is now earmarked to be gone for good but users still maintain the ability to get directions in the Maps app before booking the ride through Uber which is still a plus for all.
Uber and Google have been competing heavily in the ride-hailing and self driving space, With Google’s Waymo self driving vehicles soon set for commercial deployment, Both companies have experienced heated up competition with several lawsuits including one over Google’s confidential self driving technology information downloaded by Anthony Lewandowski who was previously a co-founder and technical lead of Google’s autonomous vehicle project Waymo before leaving and starting self driving trucking company which was later sold to Uber.
The lawsuit was settled in court February this year with Google who is a major investor in Uber after it invested $258 million into the company in 2013 with Alphabet’s Waymo unit receiving $245 million worth of shares as compensation in the legal dispute with Uber.
