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Zac Altman's 'Taxi Pro' Poses Threat to Australia's Taxi Giants

In an industry worth hundreds of millions, Zac Altman, a 19 year old from Sydney, is going face to face against Australia's taxi giants to provide the best, most simple booking experience. Altman's Taxi Pro is the only independent taxi booking application to pose a threat to the multinational corporations.

Altman has had to compete for users against the likes of Cabcharge, the largest taxi conglomerate extending internationally in Singapore. Working as an independent entity, Taxi Pro allows users to book through multiple networks including Taxis Combined, Premier Cabs and Legion Cabs.

Conceived over a year ago and built during Zac's final year at high school, the iPhone application has garnered over 40,000 users simply through word of mouth. The application has been featured by Apple numerous times and has gained support amongst the community as a result of its ability to simply work.

Numerous startups are attempting to make taxi booking easier and more reliable by competing with taxi networks, however this requires a complicated dualistic relationship between the taxi driver and the application itself and often fails to deliver. Mr Altman's goal is to directly connect with networks to provide users with the best booking experience, whilst still enabling taxi companies to maintain control over fulfilling bookings.

Zac says, "Taxi Pro allows users to book taxis, plain and simple. Users don't need excess features like a taxi whistle or data-heavy maps. They just want to get a taxi and that's what I care about."

"You can buy users with advertising but to keep them, you need to provide a great experience. Users keep coming back to Taxi Pro because I provide the best experience."

Zac has denied several offers to purchase the application from notable players in the industry, preferring to continue building Taxi Pro as Australia's favourite taxi booking application.

Facts:
Taxi Pro for Android was released on 17 December, 2011. Placing second in the Optus' Unleash Your App competition against entries from all over Australia, Taxi Pro for Android was awarded with a $1000 cash prize and a Samsung Galaxy S II Android smartphone.

Taxi Pro was conceived and built during Zac's final year at high school. He learnt iPhone development during free periods whilst studying for the HSC. He received a scholarship to UTS as part of the prestigious BiT program.