4 ms·

Yandex has some of the best programmers in the world. This was a surprise to me, but in the past 5 years, I've been spending few months a year in Belarus with v

Yandex has some of the best programmers in the world. This was a surprise to me, but in the past 5 years, I've been spending few months a year in Belarus with various engineering team and have been learning a lot about this region. Yandex has it's own school within the universities where they recruit the best minds early on and train them. I've heard from programmers who now work at FB. That they could pass google's interview tests, but could not pass the Yandex test at all. Add to that, Yandex Taxi is currently the second most popular on demand Taxi service in Russia. They might also be able to easily bypass many regulations we face here in US and get to a lot more driving data than google/uber/apple/lyft might have. What does that mean? I think, the self driving car might finally give Yandex team something to do with all the talent they've been recruiting. So I would not dismiss their efforts at all. They could become a real force very quickly.

wsinks 9y ago
What's the first most popular Taxi service? I haven't seen anyone using something different than Yandex.
- tetromino_ 9y ago
  Probably Gett. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gett https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gett
  - sshb 9y ago
    Yandex is the most popular taxi service in Russia https://www.ft.com/content/3fce1422-8fd0-11e6-a72e-b428cb934b78 https://www.ft.com/content/3fce1422-8fd0-11e6-a72e-b428cb934...
    - SXX 9y ago
      They have most popular mobile app, but there are other taxi aggregators that still heavily used and competitive on price.
- Grue3 9y ago
  Uber. You don't see it because most of the cars are unmarked.
  - konart 9y ago
    Uber is definitely less popular than either Gett or Yandex.Taxi.
- SXX 9y ago
  There is local service called RuТaxi that had 1 million rides daily and recently merged with least one other service. I suppose it's could be less popular in Moscow, but according to RBC it's larger than Yandex, Uber and Gett together. Source in Russian: http://www.rbc.ru/technology_and_media/03/05/2017/5908a5de9a7947f642b572a3 http://www.rbc.ru/technology_and_media/03/05/2017/5908a5de9a... Paywalled English version: http://www.unquote.com/cee/official-record/3004782/ufg-backs-merger-of-rutaxi-and-fasten http://www.unquote.com/cee/official-record/3004782/ufg-backs...
  - ansgri 9y ago
    It's actually better then Ya.Taxi in Moscow, yet less well-known. They have had fixed-price rides long before yandex did (they have for a couple of months). And then there are some people who use Uber, and them I really don't understand. AFAIU Uber has solved a problem nonexistent in many countries, and now tries to push its brand where there were better options long before Uber started in US. BTW, yesterday I've seen an Uber Eats-branded byciclist, now that might be competitive.
    - SXX 9y ago
      > They have had fixed-price rides long before yandex did As far as I remember RuTaxi had it even 4 years ago, but I not sure when they got mobile app since I only ever used website. > AFAIU Uber has solved a problem nonexistent in many countries, and now tries to push its brand where there were better options long before Uber started in US. As person who lived in both Russian and UK / London I understand why it's makes sense. Uber model works in countries that have one of the problems: bad public transportation (like in Russia) or very expensive taxi (like in London). Also they solve usual tourist problems that local services can't solve because you have to invest time to know what local service in $countryname is good or bad. I have no idea about other countries, but service provided by same RuTaxi for instance was worse: old dirty cars, sometimes even drunk and just scary drivers. Thanks for competition all my rides become much more pleasant in last couple of years. Also in Russia rides was more expensive: rides that cost $8 (~250RUB) back in 2012 now cost $3-4 (~150RUB). Recently I used Yandex taxi for ~5 minutes ride and paid $0.7 (30RUB).
- salimmadjd 9y ago
  The number 1 (is in process) is combination of two taxi aggregator services (RuTaxi + Fasten) banding together [0] However, on self-driving car aspect, they would not have major technical debt compared to Yandex who has the best mapping data in Russia as well as the technical expertise. [0] http://freenews-en.tk/2017/05/03/on-the-russian-market-of-taxi-aggregators-will-appear-the-largest-player/ http://freenews-en.tk/2017/05/03/on-the-russian-market-of-ta...
ex3ndr 9y ago
Most of the Yandex developers are not that good or not loyal to a company. This classes in universities is a scam: instead of teaching people of real world things, they teach how to work with yandex tech stack. Yandex lost almost all good developers and it is continue even further. Companies rent offices near yandex and find yandex developers in the restaurants around this buildings and convince them to leave. This is very easy to make a decision to leave yandex for them. Once i came to talk to yandex and ask - why they don't make good experience for mobile apps in their search results? Why they are not indexing anything related to apps? Answer was simple - user then will use this apps instead of yandex. And such toxic ideas are pretty common in the company. Talking about maps - they pushed out of the market one of the most awesome maps application in the russia. It had crappy UI, but it always make correct estimates and was able to learn your behaviour (more than 5 years ago!). While their app doesn't work at all but it couldn't because they need real drivers to make sane navigation. Then they pushed it to a taxis with a very simple trick - for taxis they made routes LONGER than it should be. This got them big fleet of a taxis. (sorry no proofs, but they are on russian and you won't understand it anyway) I hope they won't be that successful with their crappy product on the roads (they failed in almost everything in last years) and it will be much harder to compete for smaller teams as everyone will say "huh, but there are yandex guys already!". This video is a too dumb for a year of work. Voyage are better already, but they are a small team unlike yandex. Geohotz was even faster.
- salimmadjd 9y ago
  I agree with you regarding their maps and products. I stopped using google maps here in these area because of all the inaccuracies, but at the same time the UI/UX of Yandex is horrible. I do not understand why they could not create better product with better UX. It's so frustrating to use their product and it's such a shame how they manage their team based on what you're telling me. I've been told by current CS/infomratic students here that, Yandex school teaches their student a lot about heavy math CS concepts instead of a specific language.
- Dolores12 9y ago
  > This classes in universities is a scam Wow, calling Yandex classes scam is bold accusation. Are you saying that the tech stack the Yandex is using is not from real world? > Answer was simple - user then will use this apps instead of yandex. Yandex is a business, not charity. It is the same reason why google will never use encryption in their email. Because they will not be able to scan for email content to display relevant advertisement. Overall i find your reply very negative and zero value. You didn't pass yandex test, right? :)

wsinks 9y ago

What's the first most popular Taxi service? I haven't seen anyone using something different than Yandex.

tetromino_ 9y ago
Probably Gett. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gett https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gett
- sshb 9y ago
  Yandex is the most popular taxi service in Russia https://www.ft.com/content/3fce1422-8fd0-11e6-a72e-b428cb934b78 https://www.ft.com/content/3fce1422-8fd0-11e6-a72e-b428cb934...
  - SXX 9y ago
    They have most popular mobile app, but there are other taxi aggregators that still heavily used and competitive on price.
Grue3 9y ago
Uber. You don't see it because most of the cars are unmarked.
- konart 9y ago
  Uber is definitely less popular than either Gett or Yandex.Taxi.
SXX 9y ago
There is local service called RuТaxi that had 1 million rides daily and recently merged with least one other service. I suppose it's could be less popular in Moscow, but according to RBC it's larger than Yandex, Uber and Gett together. Source in Russian: http://www.rbc.ru/technology_and_media/03/05/2017/5908a5de9a7947f642b572a3 http://www.rbc.ru/technology_and_media/03/05/2017/5908a5de9a... Paywalled English version: http://www.unquote.com/cee/official-record/3004782/ufg-backs-merger-of-rutaxi-and-fasten http://www.unquote.com/cee/official-record/3004782/ufg-backs...
- ansgri 9y ago
  It's actually better then Ya.Taxi in Moscow, yet less well-known. They have had fixed-price rides long before yandex did (they have for a couple of months). And then there are some people who use Uber, and them I really don't understand. AFAIU Uber has solved a problem nonexistent in many countries, and now tries to push its brand where there were better options long before Uber started in US. BTW, yesterday I've seen an Uber Eats-branded byciclist, now that might be competitive.
  - SXX 9y ago
    > They have had fixed-price rides long before yandex did As far as I remember RuTaxi had it even 4 years ago, but I not sure when they got mobile app since I only ever used website. > AFAIU Uber has solved a problem nonexistent in many countries, and now tries to push its brand where there were better options long before Uber started in US. As person who lived in both Russian and UK / London I understand why it's makes sense. Uber model works in countries that have one of the problems: bad public transportation (like in Russia) or very expensive taxi (like in London). Also they solve usual tourist problems that local services can't solve because you have to invest time to know what local service in $countryname is good or bad. I have no idea about other countries, but service provided by same RuTaxi for instance was worse: old dirty cars, sometimes even drunk and just scary drivers. Thanks for competition all my rides become much more pleasant in last couple of years. Also in Russia rides was more expensive: rides that cost $8 (~250RUB) back in 2012 now cost $3-4 (~150RUB). Recently I used Yandex taxi for ~5 minutes ride and paid $0.7 (30RUB).
salimmadjd 9y ago
The number 1 (is in process) is combination of two taxi aggregator services (RuTaxi + Fasten) banding together [0] However, on self-driving car aspect, they would not have major technical debt compared to Yandex who has the best mapping data in Russia as well as the technical expertise. [0] http://freenews-en.tk/2017/05/03/on-the-russian-market-of-taxi-aggregators-will-appear-the-largest-player/ http://freenews-en.tk/2017/05/03/on-the-russian-market-of-ta...

ex3ndr 9y ago

Most of the Yandex developers are not that good or not loyal to a company. This classes in universities is a scam: instead of teaching people of real world things, they teach how to work with yandex tech stack. Yandex lost almost all good developers and it is continue even further. Companies rent offices near yandex and find yandex developers in the restaurants around this buildings and convince them to leave. This is very easy to make a decision to leave yandex for them. Once i came to talk to yandex and ask - why they don't make good experience for mobile apps in their search results? Why they are not indexing anything related to apps? Answer was simple - user then will use this apps instead of yandex. And such toxic ideas are pretty common in the company. Talking about maps - they pushed out of the market one of the most awesome maps application in the russia. It had crappy UI, but it always make correct estimates and was able to learn your behaviour (more than 5 years ago!). While their app doesn't work at all but it couldn't because they need real drivers to make sane navigation. Then they pushed it to a taxis with a very simple trick - for taxis they made routes LONGER than it should be. This got them big fleet of a taxis. (sorry no proofs, but they are on russian and you won't understand it anyway) I hope they won't be that successful with their crappy product on the roads (they failed in almost everything in last years) and it will be much harder to compete for smaller teams as everyone will say "huh, but there are yandex guys already!". This video is a too dumb for a year of work. Voyage are better already, but they are a small team unlike yandex. Geohotz was even faster.

salimmadjd 9y ago
I agree with you regarding their maps and products. I stopped using google maps here in these area because of all the inaccuracies, but at the same time the UI/UX of Yandex is horrible. I do not understand why they could not create better product with better UX. It's so frustrating to use their product and it's such a shame how they manage their team based on what you're telling me. I've been told by current CS/infomratic students here that, Yandex school teaches their student a lot about heavy math CS concepts instead of a specific language.
Dolores12 9y ago
> This classes in universities is a scam Wow, calling Yandex classes scam is bold accusation. Are you saying that the tech stack the Yandex is using is not from real world? > Answer was simple - user then will use this apps instead of yandex. Yandex is a business, not charity. It is the same reason why google will never use encryption in their email. Because they will not be able to scan for email content to display relevant advertisement. Overall i find your reply very negative and zero value. You didn't pass yandex test, right? :)