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Didi is booking four times the number of rides than the entire U.S — but it’s only reached 1 percent of China

Apple’s newest partner has a lot of room to grow.

Asa Mathat

Didi, China’s biggest ride-hailing company — and the recipient of a $1 billion investment from Apple — says it books four times the number of daily rides as the entire U.S. market. And it’s just reaching a tiny slice of Chinese consumers.

That’s from Didi president Jean Liu, who said the company now books 14 million rides a day in China at Day Two of the Code Conference.

That’s not a new number; Liu has shared it recently. But she said that the number is four times as large as bookings in the U.S. from Didi rival Uber and Didi partner Lyft.

And she said that the company has only penetrated one percent of China’s population. That room for growth in its home market, Liu added, is the rationale for why it continues to raise capital from companies like Apple.

“We have to find the most strategic [valued] partner because this industry is still in its infant stage,” she said. “You need a lot of strategic help.”

Uber announced today that it is raising an additional $3.5 billion.

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Growth potential for the automotive industry

This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

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