Curb opens Flow network so taxi fleets can add demand without switching systems

Why it matters

Curb is trying to make licensed taxis an interoperable supply layer for ride-hailing apps. Its utilization data is promising, but driver earnings and partner fees remain undisclosed.

Curb, led by founder and CEO Amos Tamam, is opening its Curb Flow network to additional fleets, dispatch providers and sources of ride demand across the US, UK and Canada. The expansion turns Tamam's long-running bet on connected taxi infrastructure into a direct pitch to operators: keep the systems already installed in their cars, then use Curb to pull trips from several competing platforms.

The July 20th announcement is a partner-recruitment push for an existing product. Curb first introduced the Flow API in December 2023, and its public London black-cab rollout began on March 31st, 2026. The new evidence comes from operating cabs in Washington during March, where Curb studied drivers using technology supplied by GoRide.

Tamam has spent more than three decades trying to give licensed taxis the technical reach of newer ride-hailing networks. He began as an engineer in Israel and moved to New York in his mid-20s to help a relative troubleshoot taxi-payment equipment. In 1992, he developed the Metrometer 21R, an early taximeter designed to accept credit cards. The venture failed in 1994 because wireless infrastructure could not reliably process payments from moving vehicles, according to an Entrepreneur profile of Tamam.

Tamam returned as the infrastructure improved. TaxiTronic installed card equipment in more than 3,000 New York taxis before partnering with Verifone in 2007 to form Verifone Transportation Systems. He later helped finance the management-backed purchase of Verifone's Taxi Solutions assets. A Verifone filing valued that 2017 transaction at $30 million in cash and said Verifone retained a 10% interest in an indirect parent of Curb.

A network built around existing systems

Curb Flow routes requests from multiple demand sources into the technology a driver or fleet already uses. The current network includes demand from Uber, Curb's consumer app, Taxi Butler, HQ and GRiDD. Curb says outside meter and dispatch providers can connect without replacing their own software or requiring drivers to operate another device.

That architecture addresses one of the taxi industry's persistent disadvantages against ride-hailing platforms. Licensed cabs remain divided among street hails, radio circuits, fleet dispatch tools and booking apps. Each channel can leave drivers waiting even when passengers are searching elsewhere. Curb is positioning Flow as the connective layer between those pools of demand and the installed base of taxi equipment it has spent decades building.

GoRide founder and CEO Ermias Wosenu supplied the case study for that pitch. GoRide connected its Washington taxi system to Curb Flow while keeping its existing driver workflow. Wosenu said the integration added a substantial source of trips "without requiring them to change how they work."

Curb says Flow now generates nearly half of the trips completed by participating GoRide drivers, and that some drivers complete more than 650 trips per month. Across its network, Curb claims participating drivers spend 26% more time on hired trips and cover 16% more hired miles. Curb also says nationwide booking volume has quadrupled since 2023.

The data leaves the economics unanswered

The Washington results provide evidence that aggregated demand can keep taxis occupied for longer. They do not establish how much participating drivers earn after every platform fee, commission and operating cost.

Curb did not disclose how many drivers or trips were included in the March analysis. It also omitted the comparison group, absolute hired hours and miles, statistical significance and changes in driver revenue. The figures therefore measure utilization rather than take-home income. A driver can spend longer carrying passengers and still see a smaller improvement in net earnings if the additional trips come with lower fares or higher fees.

Those missing details matter because the network has several parties seeking a share of each transaction: the demand provider, Curb, the fleet or technology partner and the driver. Curb has not published the commercial terms governing the Washington integration. Its London offer is clearer for drivers. The March 31st launch advertised zero driver commission.

Ride-hailing platforms become demand suppliers

Curb's strategy treats Uber and Lyft as potential customers for taxi capacity even as both services compete with licensed cabs for riders. That relationship has already moved beyond a theoretical API connection. On July 16th, Curb activated a Lyft integration in New York City, allowing Lyft users to be matched with taxis through equipment already installed in the vehicles.

For Uber and Lyft, access to taxi fleets can add regulated supply without recruiting every driver directly or installing a separate dispatch stack. For Curb, every outside source of bookings makes its network more useful to fleet operators and gives Tamam a way to defend the taxi industry's installed hardware from being displaced by app-only systems.

Curb says it connects more than 100,000 drivers across more than 65 cities, figures that remain company-reported. That footprint gives Flow an initial supply base, but the value of an aggregation network depends on local density. A national driver count says little about whether a passenger in a particular neighborhood can get a fast pickup or whether a driver will receive enough additional offers during a shift.

London is the next large test. Curb's UK operation grew out of Verifone Taxi Solutions and has worked in the country's taxi market for more than two decades. By letting black-cab drivers receive third-party trips through familiar systems, Curb is betting that interoperability will prove more attractive than asking fleets to replace their meters, dispatch software and working habits.

Tamam's first taxi-payment venture arrived before the network could support it. Curb Flow reverses that problem. The meters, dispatch products and ride-hailing apps already exist; Curb now has to show that connecting them produces durable earnings for drivers and a viable business for every intermediary carrying the trip.