Vietnamese mobility company Green SM has launched an electric taxi pilot in Amsterdam, making the Netherlands its second European destination after Denmark.
The service uses vehicles made by VinFast, an associated automaker that set up its Dutch headquarters in Amsterdam in 2022.
Phased rollout across city districts
Operations will initially cover Centrum, West and Zuid. Plans call for expanding into Oost, Noord, Nieuw-West and Zuidoost as the trial progresses.
Green SM operates both the booking platform and the car fleet. In the Netherlands, drivers are being recruited under either direct employment or vehicle-rental models, with rental drivers able to keep up to 85% of trip revenue.
The Android app can be downloaded here, for Apple devices here.
Discounts for trial passengers
During the testing phase, passengers can receive discounts of 50% per trip, capped at 30 euros, for up to 10 rides.
Richard Nabil Chahine, chief executive of Green SM Europe, said the company will use customer and driver feedback to adapt its service to the Dutch capital before expanding further.
Driver recruitment
The recruitment terms are unusually specific for a launch. Drivers taken on as employees are offered income of up to 3,000 euros a month. Those who rent a vehicle from the company instead keep up to 85 percent of the revenue from their trips, and the first to sign up are eligible for a joining bonus of up to 600 euros.
That matters for how fast the service can grow. A taxi operator in Amsterdam is limited less by cars than by licensed drivers, and Green SM is bidding for them against companies already established here.
How it compares with the taxi services already here
Amsterdam is not short of ways to book a car. Taxicentrale Amsterdam remains the best-known licensed operator, dispatching by phone and app, while Uber and Bolt cover the whole city with upfront pricing.
Picking up from a rank or the street is restricted to drivers belonging to a licensed taxi organisation, a city rule that shapes who can compete and where.
Green SM is competing on price and on running an entirely electric fleet. Its introductory offer, 50 percent off each trip up to 30 euros for a first ten rides, undercuts the metered fare heavily while it lasts.
Dutch taxi fares are capped by national maximum tariffs, so the established operators have limited room to answer with price alone, and the electric fleet sidesteps the low-emission restrictions that are tightening across the centre.
For anyone weighing the options, the Essentially Amsterdam guide to Amsterdam taxi services sets out what a ride should cost and how to tell a licensed car from an unlicensed one.
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