• Bolt has announced a commitment of €100 million over three years to strengthen safety measures on its platform.
• The announcement was made during a global safety campaign launch in Johannesburg.
• The investment will support The Bolt Safety Team in its critical work.

Ridesharing platform Bolt has several plans in place when it comes to improving the safety features it makes available to riders and drivers alike.

It is with this in mind that the company announced that it has committed €100 million worldwide to develop more safety-focused features over the next three years. The announcement came during a global safety campaign launch held in Johannesburg.

Over the coming months and years, Bolt says it will be looking to make more resources available to its Safety Team, focusing specifically on the critical work of product development, customer support, safety feature awareness, and preventative measures to minimise safety incidents.

For those unfamiliar with the Bolt Safety Team, it comprises over 500 specialists working on the company’s safety goals. The team is made up of safety specialists who provide 24/7 customer support from Bolt’s Safety Hubs across the globe, along with experts based in Tallinn, Estonia, who focus on product development, engineering, and operations.

“With the €100 million committed over three years to safety, we recognise that this requires an end-to-end approach across our business in South Africa. That’s why The Bolt Safety Team of over 500 specialists worldwide will focus their efforts on product development, support, and scaling preventative measures to stop safety cases before they happen in that time,” pointed out Simo Kalajdzic, senior operations manager at Bolt, regarding the investment.

“We’ll also continue to raise awareness of our safety tools with educational campaigns like the current ‘Bolt Safety Team’ campaign in South Africa to raise awareness of the in-app features we know can help prevent cases,” he added in a release shared with Hypertext.

Also present at the aforementioned local launch was Gauteng MEC for Finance and Economic Development, Lebogang Maile (pictured above), who highlighted the significance of the investment within the South African context.

“The timing of this launch is deeply symbolic as it takes place in a month that holds great significance in the calendar of South Africa and the world at large. The month of November marks the beginning of the Global 16 Days Campaign, also known as the 16 Days of Activism for No Violence Against Women and Children….I mention this because the fight against gender-based violence is important in the context of global safety and is especially significant for South Africa, a country that is marred with gender-based violence and femicide,” he explained.

“It is for this reason that Bolt’s Global Safety Campaign, and other initiatives by the company which aim to raise awareness of safety features, safety initiatives, and scaling preventative measures to prevent incidents of harassment and violence, are especially welcome in a South Africa that is battling the scourge of gender-based violence and femicide,” he continued.

With it being critical that the convenience of ridesharing apps not overshadow the need for correct safety measures being in place, it will be interesting to see what new solutions are developed by Bolt over the next three years, and now they can tackle some of the issues currently impacting travel locally.