Freenow buys Dublin's Lynk and Limerick's Swift to grow Irish B2B arm

Taxi app Freenow , owned by Lyft, is acquiring taxi dispatchers Lynk and Swift to expand its business-to-business operations in Ireland. Dublin-based Lynk has run for more than a decade, while Swift is a 35-year-old firm in Limerick serving the county and surrounding areas.

The deals push Freenow beyond the app-based bookings it's best known for. General manager for Ireland Danny O'Gorman said the acquisitions will bolster the company's reach into "pockets of taxi services" it doesn't currently cover.

Freenow says the deals give it access to public contracts with bodies such as the HSE and Tusla. That B2B angle targets a segment of the market beyond individual app riders.

Freenow is betting that owning established local dispatchers, not just running an app, is the way to lock in institutional and public-sector taxi demand in Ireland.