Ford's GoRide medical transport company is set to expand in a big way
Pretty soon GoRide will be available outside Toledo, Ohio and Southeast Michigan.
Ford's GoRide non-emergency medical transport service is about to expand to more than 40 new cities in the next few years.
Ford launched its nonemergency medical transportation service GoRide in 2018, and since then it's been quietly helping the elderly make it to their doctor appointments on time in Southeast Michigan, later expanding to Toledo, Ohio.
Now, according to a report published Tuesday by Reuters, Ford is looking at expanding the program to an additional 40 cities over the next four years, including to other cities in Ohio including Cincinnati, Cleveland, Columbus and Dayton, and beyond to states such as Florida, California, Louisiana, North Carolina and Texas.
Currently, GoRide is funded as one of Ford's new mobility programs and has yet to turn a profit, but the company's CEO Minyang Jiang expects that to change as the program grows and partners more closely with insurance companies and hospitals.
The size of GoRide's fleet of Transit vans and Transit Connects will naturally be expanding alongside the program. Jiang is quoted as saying that "By the end of the year we expect to have over 130 [vans in service]" and that number will go up to 200 by the end of 2020.
Ford isn't the only significant new player in the nonemergency medical transport business. Both Lyft and Uber have been trying to muscle in, and there are countless smaller regional companies that have long dominated the space.
