In Russia, such kind of services started way before Uber just as the next step in the evolution of taxi companies, benefitting from the same things as Uber did:

In Russia, such kind of services started way before Uber just as the next step in the evolution of taxi companies, benefitting from the same things as Uber did: no regulations, no taxes etc. The first apps were targeting JavaMe phones! So, from the Russian perspective, Uber is just another competitor in the flooded market. We were actually surprised that Uber is treated as an innovative startup in the USA.