Ridesharing Platforms and the Long Tail of Mobility

Uber and Lyft are the poster children of digitally-enabled ride-sharing companies. But these intra-urban on-demand services are not the only ones disrupting how people move. Intercity, longer distance travel has also seen changes due to algorithmic enabling: It’s a different market space where competition is with buses, trains and flights rather than taxis, and where platforms provide access to the long tail of transport supply and demand: more diverse locations and frequency than competitors.