SMRT, fully owned by the government’s Temasek Holdings, is in talks to sell its taxi business to private hire operator Grab.
If successful, SMRT with a fleet of 3,400 taxis in business for 27 years, will mark an end of their taxi business in history.
The proposal is also for SMRT to have a stake in Grab – a Malaysian start-up funded by Vertex Venture Holdings (a subsidiary of Singapore sovereign wealth fund Temasek Holdings) that is seen to be a keen rival of Uber – and at least one seat on its board of directors.
SMRT, wants the buyer to ensure all affected workers retain their jobs. But Grab it seems is not keen to take on more headcount as it has its own staff.
“Because of this, the sale is nowhere close to a deal,” a source familiar with the talks said.
SMRT is reviewing its businesses since Temasek became its sole owner and delisted it last November.
It is understood Temasek Holdings wants SMRT to double up its focus on the rail business, with a view to make the MRT and LRT lines it operates far more reliable than they have been in recent years.
The taxi sale, if successful, this could signal SMRT’s disposal of other low profit businesses such as buses.
Its smallish footprint in the bus sector grew even smaller when it lost the Bulim and Selatar route packages to Tower Transit and SBS Transit respectively.
SMRT had also wanted to start a mobility business based on autonomous road-going pods. But that too, has been shelved because of Temasek’s focus to get the rail business fully back on track.
