A new ride-hailing company is preparing to compete with Uber by being nice.

The startup called Juno plans to launch this spring with a drivers-first approach that includes taking a lower commission, offering equity in the company and even promising to hire some drivers as full-time employees. Launching in an already crowded ride-hailing field may be expensive, and the model may bring added costs, but the company is banking on success by providing a better experience for riders.

“We think that if you treat drivers better, that reflects across the board,” Chief Executive Talmon Marco told MarketWatch in an interview.

Juno will take a 10% commission from fares -- at least for the first 24 months -- compared with Uber’s take rate of 20% to 25%. Juno has not set a price for its three types of rides yet, which include basic car service, SUVs and luxury cars, but said it doesn’t plan to undercut Uber, out of deference to the drivers.

Uber declined to comment on Juno and its approach.

“ “We think that if you treat drivers better, that reflects across the board.” ” — Talmon Marco, Juno CEO

Many of Juno’s other driver’s incentives focus on long-term retention, including:

- Awarding restricted stock units to drivers who are active for 24 months. After 10 years, drivers will collectively own 50% of the founding shares of the company.

- All drivers are starting out as independent contractors, but Juno will give drivers the option to sign on as full-time or part-time employees with benefits after the company has been up and running for a few months.

- Providing a support line to drivers 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

So far the offers seem to be attracting drivers, and Marco said they have several thousand signed up.

Talmon Marco, CEO of Juno. Juno

And though Juno is coming to the market somewhat late in the game, Max Wolff, chief economist at Manhattan Venture Partners, said he believes its drivers-first model is different enough to at least sustain a launch.

“I think the opportunity is fragile and small, but it’s definitely there,” Wolff said.

Still, starting a ride-hailing company is expensive, and going up against Uber, which has $7.4 billion in funding and was last valued at $51 billion, is daunting.

But Juno appears unfazed.

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All drivers who sign up with Juno will receive a phone, and anyone who came into the office for a recent information session, regardless of whether they ultimately signed up to drive, received an envelope with $200 in cash. Marco said this was an initial promotion that has since ended.

Those who sign on are asked to help with company research before Juno launches, by turning on the Juno app and marking that they’re “busy” each time they pick up a ride through Uber or Lyft. Drivers who signed up early will be paid $50 a week for having the app on -- the number has gone down to $25 a week for more recent registrants -- and are paid for rides that Juno employees are taking during the pre-launch period.

And after starting out in May 2015, the company now has about 100 employees between its New York office in One World Trade Center, and offices in Tel Aviv, Israel and Belarus.

‘We have the liquidity today’

Juno has not raised money from institutional investors, but has raised seed funding from its own executives, friends and family, and to date has raised “an eight digit number,” Marco said. All four co-founders came from mobile messaging app Viber, which was sold to Rakuten in 2014 for $900 million.

Marco said the company has enough cash on hand to launch now, but is waiting to get the product ready: “We have the liquidity today.”

The executive acknowledges that Juno will likely end up making less per ride than rivals, but said that longer term, they won’t have to deal with litigation costs, because they are hiring some drivers as employees. Uber is currently battling a class-action suit by drivers who argue they are full-time employees, and not independent contractors, as Uber classifies them.

“This company is designed to be peaceful,” he said.

After launching, he said the company plans to spend less on rider and driver marketing. Even now, Marco said his company is no longer going out to recruit and is instead relying on word of mouth from its drivers -- several drivers at a recent session said they had found out about Juno from their friends.

“The advantage of being second or third is that we know where to find drivers,” Marco said. He expects drivers to continue with Uber or Lyft after signing up with Juno.

‘We are hoping that Juno takes over’

The drivers come from the upper-tier of Uber. To drive for Juno, the drivers need to have a minimum Uber rating of 4.70 and a car manufactured in 2011 at the latest.

Wolff said he believes price will matter less for consumers than convenience and a positive interaction with drivers. Juno has room to grow if drivers carry on the company’s culture, and thus create a better ride for consumers, he said.

Beyond that, Juno’s model, if successful, marks an important shift in the sharing economy, Wolff said, toward a focus on a nicer treatment for the employees or contractors. This could extend to the treatment of Airbnb hosts or employees at other gig economy startups.

If Juno follows through with full benefits and a salary, Badr Battaoui, a driver who signed up for Juno, said he would want to become an employee. But, for now, he said he knows he can get a reliable number of rides by driving for Uber, while Juno is still unproven.

“To tell you the truth, I trust Uber,” Battaoui said.

On the other end of the spectrum, Mohamad Gad, who drives about 40 hours a week for Uber and is also a student, said Uber’s rates aren’t “enough to survive.”

“We are hoping that Juno takes over,” Gad said.