Grab Hits the Road in Asia with International SMS and Voice
With the Vonage SMS and Voice APIs, Grab tapped into its adaptive routing algorithm to ensure messages are delivered via real time communications, regardless of the user’s location.
Vonage Solutions and Features
Challenge
Scaling user communications and user verification process in a region where non-reliable carrier infrastructure meant some text messages and calls may not be delivered, which disrupted the customer sign-up process.
Solution
A Vonage-powered customer notification and user verification process via SMS and Voice APIs.
Results
Low latency and high deliverability for SMS and voice messages, passwordless login for users and transactional and operational notifications for users via SMS.Grab is the leading ride-hailing platform that provides transportation solutions for 620 million people across 34 cities in Southeast Asia. Grab offers a wide range of services through their mobile app, including GrabTaxi, GrabCar, GrabBike, GrabHitch, GrabExpress, and GrabFood.
The company partnered with Vonage to implement a customer notification user verification process via SMS and voice messages.
Enhancing the Grab Experience with Communications
The Grab mission is to create the safest, most accessible transportation platform possible, and it needed a way to scale its user communications and user verification process. However, in many of its target geographies across Southeast Asia, non-reliable carrier infrastructure meant some text messages and calls may not be delivered, which disrupted the customer sign-up process.
To overcome these challenges, Grab partnered with Vonage to access its global cloud communications platform. After integrating the SMS API and the Voice API, Grab gained access to Vonage’s worldwide carrier network, and tapped into Vonage’s adaptive routing algorithm to ensure messages are delivered via real time communications, regardless of the user’s location.
Using Vonage’s SMS API, Grab implemented a phone number-based verification process for new drivers and passengers. When a new user registers an account, they receive an activation code delivered by SMS. Upon entering the activation code in the app, the user is automatically verified and can fully access the app.
Operational and Transactional Communications
To communicate with users during the booking process, Grab used Nexmo’s SMS API to roll out transactional and operational notifications, including booking, cancellation, and route change updates.
SMS was also used to increase user retention and engagement through localized mobile marketing campaigns. In addition, with per-second billing, Grab significantly reduced communications costs by not having to pay for unused partial minutes.
