BlaBlaCar, a virtual community connecting people willing to share the costs of a road trip, is up and running in Brazil. EFE/File Sao Paulo, Nov 30 (EFE).- BlaBlaCar, a virtual community connecting people willing to share the costs of a road trip, is up and running in Brazil, the company said Monday. The Brazil launch marks the debut of the service in Latin America. BlaBlaCar said that Brazil offers a great potential for car-sharing as a result of high tolls, recent increases in gasoline prices and the extensive use of the Internet and social networks. The Sao Paulo office is the 13th for the French start-up, which has 20 million users in a score of countries. BlaBlaCar said the Brazilian rollout is its first new initiative since raising $200 million in a funding round in September and follows launches earlier this year in India and Mexico and the acquisitions of Germany's Carpooling and Hungary's Autohop.
BlaBlaCar, the world's largest long-distance car-sharing service with some 20 million members, yesterday announced it is launching in Brazil. Having already launched services in Mexico in April and raised $200m in new investment in September, BlaBlaCar said it saw great potential in Brazil, where 50 million cars hit the roads daily. "Brazil has immense potential for long-distance car-sharing," BlaBlaCar said in a statement. The company will offer its first car share scheme to users of Brazil's national rail network, which runs from Sao Paulo to Rio de Janeiro. The country's tolls are the highest in the world while Brazilians must face a recent hike in the price of fuel."