<i>You need lots of software engineering etc skills to run this kind of service smoothly.</i><p>True, but customers can and do put up with a terrible product if they have a good reason. Look at things like Napster - that was an <i>appalling</i> product but it had millions of users because it did something people really wanted. In the case of an owner-operated Uber clone, that app could be much worse if people want to support a business owned by their local drivers more than they want the smoother service of Uber.<p>I have no idea how many people are anti-Uber enough to support a rival whose tech is only, say, 70% as good as Uber, but I wouldn&#x27;t be <i>that</i> surprised that it&#x27;d be enough to work in some regions.