What The Hell America!

It is the world’s most downloaded ride-hailing app after Uber, and inDrive’s founder and chief executive Arsen Tomsky wants to go bigger.

Since its founding in Yakutsk in Siberia more than a decade ago, inDrive has grown to be present in nearly 900 cities in Central Asia, Africa, Latin America, and elsewhere. Now, Tomsky has his sights on turning it into a super-app that offers multiple services including food delivery, groceries, and financial products. 

Unlike its rivals such as Uber, Lyft, and Didi, inDrive doesn’t automatically match passengers and drivers. Instead, the algorithm recommends prices to drivers making bids for passengers, based on their origin and destination. Passengers select from these bids, and drivers can accept, decline, or counter with another offer. This model, with people setting the prices, is fairer and more transparent, and gives passengers and drivers more freedom than prices set solely by algorithms, Tomsky believes. Some drivers, though, have complained that they are often forced to agree to lower fares.

InDrive recently launched financial services, and entered the grocery business in Pakistan. Tomsky also set up Ayta AI, which helps people with a stutter sound natural on video calls. On the sidelines of the Web Summit in Rio de Janeiro in April, Tomsky spoke to Rest of World about his strategy and the role of artificial intelligence in his business. 

On what makes inDrive’s peer-to-peer fare model unique

It is a fair and transparent model, while our competitors have artificially low fares by giving heavy bonuses and incentives to drivers, and a lot of free rides and discounts to passengers. But they have high commissions or they sometimes increase fares — surge pricing, when the fares go up two or three times even. The algorithms are not transparent.  

We take just about 12% commission and we don’t set the fares, the people do — the customers and the drivers. In our system, drivers and passengers see the full information. The drivers see what price is proposed, and they can skip it if they don’t like it. Or they can use special filters: “I don’t want to see too cheap fares.” They have full freedom of choice. And they will not have any negative consequences for skipping. It’s a very different feeling, like being small entrepreneurs.  

On how AI is used in the inDrive app

Of course, we are also using AI. Within our app, the algorithm works to determine recommended pricing. Our drivers and passengers have the final say on prices they agree on, with each having the freedom to accept or reject. In some cities, we offer the alternative of not having to negotiate, letting the algorithm decide on a fare. It is a second option, not the main option. We are just testing it, and we will slowly introduce it in some cities. 

Human connection and negotiation will always be at the core of our product. I don’t want to build one more small Uber.

On inDrive’s expansion plans, and building a super-app 

We are entering new segments because we see a lot of injustice from large companies, and monopolies in too many fields. We are beginning to enter the dark store [a shop that exists only to fulfill online orders]. We are testing it in Kazakhstan, where we invested in a dark-store player called Ryadom. We will then go to other countries. 

And step by step, we are going to build something like a super-app. It’s very logical for us as we continue to expand and diversify beyond mobility. We have an official goal, to impact at least 1 billion people by 2030. We want to be across the last mile of delivery, and also in the fields of education and health care. I don’t know now how health care and education will fit into this super-app. It won’t be like a Chinese super-app. But I am sure we will find a way. We are looking to pilot in select markets.

On inDrive becoming profitable 

This year we are going to become net profitable. As I said, we avoid bonuses, discounts, promotions, and so on. And we are lean — we don’t have thousands of software engineers in Silicon Valley. We have almost 3,000 people in 28 offices around the globe. In 2022, we moved around 1,000 people from Russia because of the war, to Cyprus and Kazakhstan. We also have 300–400 people in Mexico. Brazil, Colombia, India, Indonesia, and Pakistan are our other major hubs.

On exiting Miami, and entering new markets

We launched in Miami [inDrive’s only U.S. market] in 2023 and left in 2025. It was a test launch for us, and we realized that operating in the U.S. is very expensive because of the increase in insurance prices. We can relaunch there in the future, but not for now. For us it makes more sense to be in developing countries, where people are more price-conscious, they value each dollar. We entered Southeast Asia recently, and we are now active in six countries there, including Malaysia, Indonesia, and Thailand. 

On why fairness in business matters

I’m obsessed with the question of fairness because I’ve met with a lot of injustice in my life. We can begin with the fact that I was born in the coldest city in the world [Yakutsk]. You can call that a form of climate injustice. I’m a stutterer — that is another injustice. I’ve had domestic violence in my family, and that’s one more kind of injustice. And now I have a real chance to change this for other people with my business and philanthropy.