Though lagging far behind ride-hail giants Uber and Lyft in the U.S. market, startup Juno is trying to make inroads by treating its drivers better than the big guys.

Juno, operating in the New York market, is raising the stakes by offering better pay, recognized employee status, a driver support hotline and even shares in the company at a time when Uber and Lyft are fighting battles with government agencies about whether their drivers are employees or independent contractors.

Founder and CEO Talmon Marco says his company’s approach makes happier drivers and better customer experiences.

"The sharing economy left unchecked is a sure way to slowly squeeze the little guy," said Marco. "And I don't claim to be a great socialist. I'm really not. But it's a great way to take the bottom tier of the middle class and push it lower."

Marco’s run at Juno is funded from his sale of startup Viber in 2014 for a cool $900 million. He studied the ride-hail market and decided there was a place for a company that treated the drivers with more respect.

“I came to the conclusion that drivers really hate ride-sharing companies, which have been abusing them and treating them like a commodity."

He points to Uber's practice of "deactivating" drivers in its system, rather than firing them in a more traditional and open sense, as one example of the withered human element in the company's management schema. "These are people," he said. "You do not deactivate people—you deactivate machines. When you say that you deactivate a person, I think that speaks volumes of the way that you actually think of these people."

Marco maintains that withholding stability, benefits, and incentives is unfair. He says the key to a sustainable ride-hailing platform is giving drivers the wages and resources they need to be happy and committed in their work so that they--and satisfied customers--will stick around.

Juno, as a company, believes brand loyalty that has evaded bigger ride-hail companies will come to Juno. Marco said Juno is charging rates comparable to Uber and Lyft while letting drivers hold on to as much as 10-15 percent more of their fares.

Juno may be at the tip of a trend in the industry. Taxi cooperatives, or organizations in which drivers have a say and stake in operations, are now cropping up across the map. New Yorkers can use Juno, which gives 50 percent of the company's equity to highly-screened drivers. Denver residents can get a ride through the recently formed Green Taxi Cooperative, while customers in Austin can use the nonprofit RideAustin.

It is no coincidence that Uber and Lyft abandoned Austin when local government tried to impose restrictions on the ride-hail companies.

When asked why he started his service in New York, Marco responded by saying, “As the song goes — if you can make it there, you can make it everywhere. We don't feel that the tight regulation in NYC, the Taxi & Limousine Commission (TLC) specifically, makes our overall life more complicated. Yes, there are certain regulatory requirements, but it also makes things very clear and thus easier,” he said. “Consider doing business in a developed market such as the United States versus some unarmed country where there is no rule of law and you can do anything you want. At the end of the day, doing business in a developed market is easier. Same for NYC and TLC. We actually think it makes our lives easier.”

Marco said the investment community has been supportive. “In a very positive way. Even before looking at financial models, people understand — at the "gut feeling" level — that being nice and loved by the people you work with, and by the people that end up providing your services, is the right thing from a business standpoint.”

Marco said there some legal challenges associated with offering stock options to independent contractors. “Designing the legal structure has been difficult. If I look at our legal fees to date, most of them went towards this,” he said.