Uber IPO
May 10, 2019 4:27 AM Subscribe
Uber (many previouslies) goes on sale this morning. Why investors can't wait to buy into Uber, a company that's never made money — and maybe never will.
The article mentions a couple of previous technologies booms that went bust - railroads a century ago, and the 2000 tech bubble. In the first case, we were at least left with lots of railway lines that could be used after the companies that built them went bust, and in the second case we were at least left with some dark fibre that could be used after the bankruptcies.
I'm not sure that Uber will leave anything of value behind when it goes bust.
posted by clawsoon at 5:14 AM on May 10, 2019 [10 favorites]
I'm not sure that Uber will leave anything of value behind when it goes bust.
posted by clawsoon at 5:14 AM on May 10, 2019 [10 favorites]
So why buy? For investors, the case in favour of these companies basically boils down to two ideas: They will make money as more people ditch car ownership and opt for ride sharing instead, and self-driving cars will turn them into autonomous cash machines.
Both of these things, which are the best possible outcome investors can imagine, are at least a decade away. At the current pace, Uber will be $40 billion in the red by the time this happens. And when/if these predictions do in fact come true, Uber's biggest gamble (we can drive the local cab companies out of business by subsidizing our rider's costs, and then we'll be the only game in town) is a demonstrable failure: cab companies are changing tactics, and drivers will happily bounce between medallion cabs and whichever rideshare provider pays the best, because they have no loyalty to a company who treats them terribly.
I have yet to see a coherent argument for how Uber will ever make money. If you're investing in a company whose profitability isn't even plausible, and your hope is that everyone else has the same blindspot you do and will drive the share prices even further up, then you might as well start investing in tulip futures.
posted by Mayor West at 5:18 AM on May 10, 2019 [23 favorites]
Both of these things, which are the best possible outcome investors can imagine, are at least a decade away. At the current pace, Uber will be $40 billion in the red by the time this happens. And when/if these predictions do in fact come true, Uber's biggest gamble (we can drive the local cab companies out of business by subsidizing our rider's costs, and then we'll be the only game in town) is a demonstrable failure: cab companies are changing tactics, and drivers will happily bounce between medallion cabs and whichever rideshare provider pays the best, because they have no loyalty to a company who treats them terribly.
I have yet to see a coherent argument for how Uber will ever make money. If you're investing in a company whose profitability isn't even plausible, and your hope is that everyone else has the same blindspot you do and will drive the share prices even further up, then you might as well start investing in tulip futures.
posted by Mayor West at 5:18 AM on May 10, 2019 [23 favorites]
Yeah, but a lot of people have made real money trading tulip futures. My brother-in-law heard about this guy who started with nothing but a handful of florins, and by the time he cashed out his Admirael van Enkhuizen contract bought him 30 acres of good farm land.
posted by sfenders at 5:39 AM on May 10, 2019 [31 favorites]
posted by sfenders at 5:39 AM on May 10, 2019 [31 favorites]
No bubbles here...
posted by overglow at 5:47 AM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by overglow at 5:47 AM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]
The first idea doesn't help Uber get to profitability. It just means the they continue to lose money on more rides. There aren't many economies of scale to ride hailing apps.
The barriers to entry in this market are quite small and people have very little loyalty to ride sharing apps as far as I have seen. If Uber raises their rates to get to profitability then they will be undercut by the competition.
posted by nolnacs at 5:55 AM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
The barriers to entry in this market are quite small and people have very little loyalty to ride sharing apps as far as I have seen. If Uber raises their rates to get to profitability then they will be undercut by the competition.
posted by nolnacs at 5:55 AM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
Uber’s market position is built on race-to-the-bottom wages and the tax avoidance that is available via the IRS’s 58 cents per mile and other write-offs..
Uber has no “moat” — the big car manufacturers want to do to them what they did to the licensed taxi, livery, and airport shuttle companies.
posted by Heywood Mogroot III at 5:56 AM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
Uber has no “moat” — the big car manufacturers want to do to them what they did to the licensed taxi, livery, and airport shuttle companies.
posted by Heywood Mogroot III at 5:56 AM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
I have yet to see a coherent argument for how Uber will ever make money.
“There’s a sucker born every minute.” Is what I can figure.
posted by Big Al 8000 at 6:02 AM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
“There’s a sucker born every minute.” Is what I can figure.
posted by Big Al 8000 at 6:02 AM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
Uber has no “moat” — the big car manufacturers want to do to them what they did to the licensed taxi, livery, and airport shuttle companies.
That decade away end goal of a fleet of automated cars - that's where the big car manufacturers take over and Uber dies.
Right now Uber has to manage their drivers, not the vehicles. And they do that as arms-length as possible. The infrastructure of owning and maintaining their own fleet? A big taxi company that owns their own cars could pivot that way. A car company that already has acres and acres of lots could pivot that way. Uber is just not set up for that.
posted by thecjm at 6:09 AM on May 10, 2019 [6 favorites]
That decade away end goal of a fleet of automated cars - that's where the big car manufacturers take over and Uber dies.
Right now Uber has to manage their drivers, not the vehicles. And they do that as arms-length as possible. The infrastructure of owning and maintaining their own fleet? A big taxi company that owns their own cars could pivot that way. A car company that already has acres and acres of lots could pivot that way. Uber is just not set up for that.
posted by thecjm at 6:09 AM on May 10, 2019 [6 favorites]
By the way, did you know that if you hail a ride with Uber, you're not actually their customer - the driver is?
Yes - they put that in their IPO disclosure in black and white.
posted by NoxAeternum at 6:11 AM on May 10, 2019 [16 favorites]
Yes - they put that in their IPO disclosure in black and white.
posted by NoxAeternum at 6:11 AM on May 10, 2019 [16 favorites]
I'm not exactly sure what a "profit margin" is, but I'm pretty sure -59.95% is a bad one.
posted by clawsoon at 6:12 AM on May 10, 2019 [11 favorites]
posted by clawsoon at 6:12 AM on May 10, 2019 [11 favorites]
The only ethical position is to ignore this IPO. It will probably double in value within the first two days but, Cthulhu willing, then bust down well below this valuation. Eventually. Okay maybe in a few months when investors take a look at the barren wasteland that is long term planning.
Hahaha never mind moneyed tech bros full of unearned optimism will keep it afloat for years until it becomes a respected brand like Procter & Gamble, diversified across many regulatory arbitrage ventures. Are murderbots illegal *everywhere*? How about the expectation of privacy in the back of a cab with cameras in it - monetizable anonymity! Try Uber Mobile Anonymous 3D printing - no questions asked and ammunition - uh - metal entertainment fun cartridge - included in the fee!
posted by abulafa at 6:15 AM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]
Hahaha never mind moneyed tech bros full of unearned optimism will keep it afloat for years until it becomes a respected brand like Procter & Gamble, diversified across many regulatory arbitrage ventures. Are murderbots illegal *everywhere*? How about the expectation of privacy in the back of a cab with cameras in it - monetizable anonymity! Try Uber Mobile Anonymous 3D printing - no questions asked and ammunition - uh - metal entertainment fun cartridge - included in the fee!
posted by abulafa at 6:15 AM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]
Yeah, but a lot of people have made real money trading tulip futures. My brother-in-law heard about this guy who started with nothing but a handful of florins, and by the time he cashed out his Admirael van Enkhuizen contract bought him 30 acres of good farm land.
Yep, the Uber millionaires are doing that - and fleeing to low tax locales as they do.
posted by NoxAeternum at 6:15 AM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]
Yep, the Uber millionaires are doing that - and fleeing to low tax locales as they do.
posted by NoxAeternum at 6:15 AM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]
The barriers to entry in this market are quite small
It's pretty large. The big thing that Uber and Lyft (who also just IPOed and also lose money hand over fist - and whose stock price soared and then plunged) offer is ubiquity and availability with a fairly consistent user experience in major cities. Being able to have a single app that just works almost anywhere you travel is a huge advantage. Until they run out of easy money to subsidize their costs, local only upstarts are going to have trouble making inroads into the market.
I try to use taxis as much as possible but have given up on them for getting to the airport in the morning in my home city, because I can't reliably get one early in the morning.
posted by Candleman at 6:19 AM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
It's pretty large. The big thing that Uber and Lyft (who also just IPOed and also lose money hand over fist - and whose stock price soared and then plunged) offer is ubiquity and availability with a fairly consistent user experience in major cities. Being able to have a single app that just works almost anywhere you travel is a huge advantage. Until they run out of easy money to subsidize their costs, local only upstarts are going to have trouble making inroads into the market.
I try to use taxis as much as possible but have given up on them for getting to the airport in the morning in my home city, because I can't reliably get one early in the morning.
posted by Candleman at 6:19 AM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
One of the first times I've been tempted to learn how to short a stock.
posted by thefool at 6:23 AM on May 10, 2019 [5 favorites]
posted by thefool at 6:23 AM on May 10, 2019 [5 favorites]
One piece of good news: Uber will get a lot less money from this IPO than they were initially hoping to, in part because of the fall of Lyft's stock.
posted by clawsoon at 6:25 AM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by clawsoon at 6:25 AM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]
By the way, did you know that if you hail a ride with Uber, you're not actually their customer - the driver is?
If you are not paying [very much] for it, you're not the customer; you're the product being sold.
posted by TedW at 6:33 AM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]
If you are not paying [very much] for it, you're not the customer; you're the product being sold.
posted by TedW at 6:33 AM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]
I'm not sure that Uber will leave anything of value behind when it goes bust.
More allies for the proletariat uprising.
posted by Christ, what an asshole at 6:33 AM on May 10, 2019 [6 favorites]
More allies for the proletariat uprising.
posted by Christ, what an asshole at 6:33 AM on May 10, 2019 [6 favorites]
Reminds me of the Facebook IPO. Many analysts and finance professors were skeptical - Facebook was sold for $38 at IPO and rapidly fell to $28. They would need to grow their revenues by 40% compounded each year for the next 10 years to justify their market value. I thought it was ridiculous.
Today Facebook is worth $180+ per share and we are all eating our hats.
Not sure if it's Tesla, Uber or Google that will be the first to a self driving fleet, but they will likely become another $1 trillion company if they do...
posted by xdvesper at 6:37 AM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]
Today Facebook is worth $180+ per share and we are all eating our hats.
Not sure if it's Tesla, Uber or Google that will be the first to a self driving fleet, but they will likely become another $1 trillion company if they do...
posted by xdvesper at 6:37 AM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]
NoxAeternum: By the way, did you know that if you hail a ride with Uber, you're not actually their customer - the driver is?
Interesting. Sounds like they're trying to position themselves like a real estate agent: The house seller is the customer of the real estate agent, while the buyer is the customer of the house seller and is not the customer of the real estate agent.
posted by clawsoon at 6:38 AM on May 10, 2019
Interesting. Sounds like they're trying to position themselves like a real estate agent: The house seller is the customer of the real estate agent, while the buyer is the customer of the house seller and is not the customer of the real estate agent.
posted by clawsoon at 6:38 AM on May 10, 2019
xdvesper: Reminds me of the Facebook IPO.
But Facebook was at least making a profit before it had its IPO. Uber would prefer that you compare it to Amazon.
posted by clawsoon at 6:44 AM on May 10, 2019
But Facebook was at least making a profit before it had its IPO. Uber would prefer that you compare it to Amazon.
posted by clawsoon at 6:44 AM on May 10, 2019
The reason people are willing to invest in Uber despite the long horizon of the real moneymakers is that Uber does in fact make an operating profit in many markets, especially now that they aren't basically paying for drivers' cars through the subsidized lease program.
They wouldn't have a chance in hell of making money if they paid drivers reasonably, mind, but the shitty pay leaves them a good opportunity to at least break even until whatever miracle finally shows up, if they get some decent management, anyway.
posted by wierdo at 6:45 AM on May 10, 2019
They wouldn't have a chance in hell of making money if they paid drivers reasonably, mind, but the shitty pay leaves them a good opportunity to at least break even until whatever miracle finally shows up, if they get some decent management, anyway.
posted by wierdo at 6:45 AM on May 10, 2019
The Uber I.P.O. Is a Moral Stain on Silicon Valley. I'm not sure I fully agree, and even now I have some optimism Uber will mature into a profitable company. But it's a great editorial and it's remarkable that Farhad Manjoo of all people wrote it.
In the years since, Uber skirted laws and cut corners to trample over regulators and competitors. It accelerated the start-up industry’s misogynistic and reckless hustle culture. And it pushed a frightening new picture of labor — one in which everyone is a contractor, toiling without protection, our hours and our lives ruled by uncaring algorithms in the cloud.posted by Nelson at 6:51 AM on May 10, 2019 [8 favorites]
Yeah, Amazon lost literal tons of money every year for years and years with an absurd business plan that could never possibly work--until it did. Not that Uber is in the same position, but as long as they can sell themselves as such to investor dummies, they'll have plenty of takers and they can keep burning through money as long as there are people with money to lose on "the next Amazon."
posted by rikschell at 7:00 AM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by rikschell at 7:00 AM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]
Not sure if it's Tesla, Uber or Google that will be the first to a self driving fleet, but they will likely become another $1 trillion company if they do...
Unless only one guy has an autonomous fleet (which BTW - is literally decades away unless there is some leap forward in Lidar, in which case its a decade away) it probably won't be a very good business. You'll have to own a massive fleet of cars, and yeah your utilization will be high, but if there are competitive players you'll price for utilization like any other rental business.
Anyways, its usually not a very interesting question to ask why people are paying up for the the exciting growth stories. More interesting to ask what will make them decided that growth isn't coming. Something like Uber where there are no profits and no near-term hope of profits behooves themselves to train people not to expect profits, because then its harder for the story to break unless revenue disappoints, which for some period of time they can just buy. So then the question is how long can they afford to buy revenue.
posted by JPD at 7:00 AM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]
Unless only one guy has an autonomous fleet (which BTW - is literally decades away unless there is some leap forward in Lidar, in which case its a decade away) it probably won't be a very good business. You'll have to own a massive fleet of cars, and yeah your utilization will be high, but if there are competitive players you'll price for utilization like any other rental business.
Anyways, its usually not a very interesting question to ask why people are paying up for the the exciting growth stories. More interesting to ask what will make them decided that growth isn't coming. Something like Uber where there are no profits and no near-term hope of profits behooves themselves to train people not to expect profits, because then its harder for the story to break unless revenue disappoints, which for some period of time they can just buy. So then the question is how long can they afford to buy revenue.
posted by JPD at 7:00 AM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]
Uber does not (yet?) have a monopoly or near monopoly platform like Facebook. Also I wouldn't rely on their autonomous vehicle work vs. Alphabet (Google - Waymo), large established automotive companies, or more focused startups. (Or startups purchased by large established automotive companies.)
posted by thefool at 7:01 AM on May 10, 2019
posted by thefool at 7:01 AM on May 10, 2019
Buried in Uber's IPO filing - plans to kneecap public transportation.
posted by Thorzdad at 7:02 AM on May 10, 2019 [21 favorites]
posted by Thorzdad at 7:02 AM on May 10, 2019 [21 favorites]
more people ditch car ownership
This will never happen. Mothers hauling kids and groceries never take the cab. Fathers who keep a bat and glove in the trunk for Thursday night softball leagues don't either.
My GF is running late for our coffee date because her daughter forgot something in the car, and my GF went to the school to drop it off. How does that work with our autonomous taxi overlords ?
The solution to car ownership is walkability and density, not "shared" ownership by a multinational conglomerate of financiers and yes-men. I'm 6'4" - I have the car I do - and never take the bus - because above everything else, it doesn't hurt me to sit in it.
Only multimillion dollar net worth yahoos who ride a car service everywhere could be that out of touch with how and why people use their cars.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 7:03 AM on May 10, 2019 [15 favorites]
This will never happen. Mothers hauling kids and groceries never take the cab. Fathers who keep a bat and glove in the trunk for Thursday night softball leagues don't either.
My GF is running late for our coffee date because her daughter forgot something in the car, and my GF went to the school to drop it off. How does that work with our autonomous taxi overlords ?
The solution to car ownership is walkability and density, not "shared" ownership by a multinational conglomerate of financiers and yes-men. I'm 6'4" - I have the car I do - and never take the bus - because above everything else, it doesn't hurt me to sit in it.
Only multimillion dollar net worth yahoos who ride a car service everywhere could be that out of touch with how and why people use their cars.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 7:03 AM on May 10, 2019 [15 favorites]
Yeah, Amazon lost literal tons of money every year for years and years with an absurd business plan that could never possibly work--until it did.
Well...it's complicated.
posted by Thorzdad at 7:06 AM on May 10, 2019 [4 favorites]
Well...it's complicated.
posted by Thorzdad at 7:06 AM on May 10, 2019 [4 favorites]
I have yet to see a coherent argument for how Uber will ever make money.
In the movie Contact, Jodie Foster's character is given a suicide pill before she gets in the spaceship to who-knows-where. She asks why, and is told, "There are a thousand reasons we can think of for you to have this with you, but mostly it's for the reasons we can't think of."
If Uber is still a going concern in a decade, it'll be because of something that isn't even on our (or its) radar. Amazon makes most of its operating profit from web hosting. Apple makes more money from music than from computers, nearly four decades after promising to never sell music. Shell Oil got its name because it started as an antique store that imported seashells to the UK.
posted by Etrigan at 7:17 AM on May 10, 2019 [9 favorites]
In the movie Contact, Jodie Foster's character is given a suicide pill before she gets in the spaceship to who-knows-where. She asks why, and is told, "There are a thousand reasons we can think of for you to have this with you, but mostly it's for the reasons we can't think of."
If Uber is still a going concern in a decade, it'll be because of something that isn't even on our (or its) radar. Amazon makes most of its operating profit from web hosting. Apple makes more money from music than from computers, nearly four decades after promising to never sell music. Shell Oil got its name because it started as an antique store that imported seashells to the UK.
posted by Etrigan at 7:17 AM on May 10, 2019 [9 favorites]
Well, the multimillionaires and those of us who can avoid the expense and hassle of owning and driving a car thanks to having reasonably reliable taxi service available.
posted by wierdo at 7:17 AM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by wierdo at 7:17 AM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
Not sure if it's Tesla, Uber or Google that will be the first to a self driving fleet, but they will likely become another $1 trillion company if they do...
I would bet on the people who own the most cars.
posted by tclark at 7:19 AM on May 10, 2019
I would bet on the people who own the most cars.
posted by tclark at 7:19 AM on May 10, 2019
Investors in Uber are investing in the possibility that it will one day be a monopoly - the company is “blitzscaling” in the hope that all its competitors will be driven out of business. (Like buying the pot in poker: someone else may have a better hand / better business model, but in the end they can’t afford to continue competing.) Once in that position, they can then abuse their monopoly status and jack up prices on everyone who has sold their car and stopped using public transport and now has no other option.
The problem for Uber isn’t that this is a stupid strategy in general terms - the US and many of its other markets don’t have strong competition regulations, so in many industries this is perfectly sensible.
The first problem is that Uber’s business model is simple and easily replicated (they lack a “moat”), so they can be outcompeted on various criteria.
The second is that one of those criteria, perhaps surprisingly, turns out to be “who has more money to burn”. Their competitor in this space is Didi, who are prepared to slash customer fares as low and as long as possible until Uber blinks. Uber already blinked in China - the Uber app still exists in the PRC, but it’s now owned by Didi, not Uber. And in other markets (like the one where I live), Didi is strolling in after Uber has done the heavy lifting of establishing their concept and building up a fleet of drivers, then poaching both their drivers and customers by offering better terms to both. And Didi is backed by TenCent, among others, and has very deep pockets.
posted by chappell, ambrose at 7:21 AM on May 10, 2019 [10 favorites]
The problem for Uber isn’t that this is a stupid strategy in general terms - the US and many of its other markets don’t have strong competition regulations, so in many industries this is perfectly sensible.
The first problem is that Uber’s business model is simple and easily replicated (they lack a “moat”), so they can be outcompeted on various criteria.
The second is that one of those criteria, perhaps surprisingly, turns out to be “who has more money to burn”. Their competitor in this space is Didi, who are prepared to slash customer fares as low and as long as possible until Uber blinks. Uber already blinked in China - the Uber app still exists in the PRC, but it’s now owned by Didi, not Uber. And in other markets (like the one where I live), Didi is strolling in after Uber has done the heavy lifting of establishing their concept and building up a fleet of drivers, then poaching both their drivers and customers by offering better terms to both. And Didi is backed by TenCent, among others, and has very deep pockets.
posted by chappell, ambrose at 7:21 AM on May 10, 2019 [10 favorites]
I'm not sure that Uber will leave anything of value behind when it goes bust.
UI/UX interface improvements in ride hailing. That's about it.
posted by srboisvert at 7:34 AM on May 10, 2019 [5 favorites]
UI/UX interface improvements in ride hailing. That's about it.
posted by srboisvert at 7:34 AM on May 10, 2019 [5 favorites]
Also hopefully a healthy skepticism of the gig economy and Silicon Valley "disruption". And if we're making a wishlist, then also some laws in place to protect workers who would be exploited by these companies and the willingness to enforce them.
posted by ODiV at 7:41 AM on May 10, 2019 [5 favorites]
posted by ODiV at 7:41 AM on May 10, 2019 [5 favorites]
Buried in Uber's IPO filing - plans to kneecap public transportation.
This is my nightmare. The answer to congestion in our cities is not self-driving cars, or more taxis, it is shared transportation. No ride-sharing service can move hundreds of people in one vehicle like a streetcar, or thousands of people like a metro.
And that shared transportation has to stay public, because it serves everyone. There is no ride-sharing service that serves anyone without a smart phone, or without a credit card. I know people who don't have smart phones, who can't get credit cards. In my city, just switching from physical fares (tokens) to cards that require minimum top-ups is risking the exclusion of the most marginalized people from our public transit.
posted by jb at 7:51 AM on May 10, 2019 [23 favorites]
This is my nightmare. The answer to congestion in our cities is not self-driving cars, or more taxis, it is shared transportation. No ride-sharing service can move hundreds of people in one vehicle like a streetcar, or thousands of people like a metro.
And that shared transportation has to stay public, because it serves everyone. There is no ride-sharing service that serves anyone without a smart phone, or without a credit card. I know people who don't have smart phones, who can't get credit cards. In my city, just switching from physical fares (tokens) to cards that require minimum top-ups is risking the exclusion of the most marginalized people from our public transit.
posted by jb at 7:51 AM on May 10, 2019 [23 favorites]
You can't make long-distance personal transport cheaper except through combining trips. It's not a problem you can solve Amazon style with astonishing warehouses closer and closer to point of delivery.
The only commoditizable aspect of transportation is the number of seats in the vehicle; the only optimizable variable is vehicle miles / passenger miles. You make it cheaper my finding where people want to come from, where they want to go, and put more seats on fewer vehicles to take them there.
You know, MASS TRANSIT.
Uber today is about where Bitcoin was maybe three years ago. From here on out it's suckers all the way down.
posted by seanmpuckett at 7:52 AM on May 10, 2019 [5 favorites]
The only commoditizable aspect of transportation is the number of seats in the vehicle; the only optimizable variable is vehicle miles / passenger miles. You make it cheaper my finding where people want to come from, where they want to go, and put more seats on fewer vehicles to take them there.
You know, MASS TRANSIT.
Uber today is about where Bitcoin was maybe three years ago. From here on out it's suckers all the way down.
posted by seanmpuckett at 7:52 AM on May 10, 2019 [5 favorites]
I don't know what Uber's share of the 2030 personal transportation market will be ... but the core transportation market transformation that the company depends upon -- people ditching personal vehicles AND public transportation for app-based rides when they are amply available -- is already happening.
Talk to anyone who leases office space in LA or the Bay Area and they'll tell you that tenants are demanding fewer parking spaces per expected headcount.
Talk to anyone who travels for business regularly about the cities where they used to have no choice but to rent cars where they now use Uber or Lyft on most trips.
Talk to the parents teenagers about how relatively unenthused their kids are about getting a license and a car, or being allowed to ride the subway or commuter train alone, when (for the parent) that was the pinnacle goal when they were teenagers.
posted by MattD at 7:59 AM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
Talk to anyone who leases office space in LA or the Bay Area and they'll tell you that tenants are demanding fewer parking spaces per expected headcount.
Talk to anyone who travels for business regularly about the cities where they used to have no choice but to rent cars where they now use Uber or Lyft on most trips.
Talk to the parents teenagers about how relatively unenthused their kids are about getting a license and a car, or being allowed to ride the subway or commuter train alone, when (for the parent) that was the pinnacle goal when they were teenagers.
posted by MattD at 7:59 AM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
Uber-rich:
Celebrities known to have invested in Uber include Beyoncé and Jay-Z, Lance Armstrong and Troy Carter, the former manager of Lady Gaga. Their stakes are not disclosed.
the wealthy people who will get even wealthier from IPO
posted by Mister Bijou at 8:02 AM on May 10, 2019
Celebrities known to have invested in Uber include Beyoncé and Jay-Z, Lance Armstrong and Troy Carter, the former manager of Lady Gaga. Their stakes are not disclosed.
the wealthy people who will get even wealthier from IPO
posted by Mister Bijou at 8:02 AM on May 10, 2019
MattD: I don't know what Uber's share of the 2030 personal transportation market will be ... but the core market condition that the company depends upon -- people ditching personal vehicles AND public transportation -- when app-based rides are amply available -- already happening.
That's an interesting point. Will it keep happening when ridesharing prices rise to match the cost of providing the service?
(If I'm doing my math correctly, this IPO will give Uber enough money to survive 2-3 more years at current loss rates.)
posted by clawsoon at 8:04 AM on May 10, 2019 [5 favorites]
That's an interesting point. Will it keep happening when ridesharing prices rise to match the cost of providing the service?
(If I'm doing my math correctly, this IPO will give Uber enough money to survive 2-3 more years at current loss rates.)
posted by clawsoon at 8:04 AM on May 10, 2019 [5 favorites]
Talk to anyone who leases office space in LA or the Bay Area and they'll tell you that tenants are demanding fewer parking spaces per expected headcount.
HAHAHAHAHAHA. Duuuuuuude. This is so opposite of any known reality I don't even know how to respond. I've been office hunting in my admittedly not-a-major city and parking is a very big part of the equation for the viability of any given office. I might believe that CEOs in are willing to give up some parking for better prices, but the idea they are demanding fewer parking spaces is risible.
posted by elwoodwiles at 8:08 AM on May 10, 2019
HAHAHAHAHAHA. Duuuuuuude. This is so opposite of any known reality I don't even know how to respond. I've been office hunting in my admittedly not-a-major city and parking is a very big part of the equation for the viability of any given office. I might believe that CEOs in are willing to give up some parking for better prices, but the idea they are demanding fewer parking spaces is risible.
posted by elwoodwiles at 8:08 AM on May 10, 2019
Elwood, you appear not to know what "demand" means in the context of a market. It doesn't mean "insist on fewer parking spaces" (which of course no one does). It means that when they specify the minimum number of spaces per expected employee, that ratio has been declining. (For a lot of tenants that ratio has been between 1.0 and 2.0 depending upon expected vendor and client visits, and brokers will tell you that it is declining.) Zoning requirements relating to minimum parking spaces are also being reduced, and that reflects assumptions about decreasing personal vehicle commutation.
posted by MattD at 8:24 AM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by MattD at 8:24 AM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]
The environmental consequences of what Uber plans - the launching of yet more vehicles that requires polluting industries to make them however hybrid they may be, the possibility of then gutting public transit and so on - freak me out almost as much as the shitty future of human exploitation their business model relies on.
posted by lesbiassparrow at 8:27 AM on May 10, 2019 [7 favorites]
posted by lesbiassparrow at 8:27 AM on May 10, 2019 [7 favorites]
I think their current cash burn rate (per NPR last night) is like $1B / quarter and they are expected to raise between $6-8B via the IPO. So they are looking at 18 to 24 months of burn, and in exchange for this rather short runway have made a one-way, one-time deal.
Looks dumb AF to me... except: there are presumably a lot of insiders within Uber who are sitting on great gobs of pre-IPO shares that aren't hugely liquid and want to cash out. They want to unload their shares in a way that won't depress the price, which might happen on the private markets that have been set up for such things, and going public lets them do that.
So the benefit isn't really to the company per se, it's to the current owners of the company who get to exit. And will presumably be safely away from the wreckage when it finally goes down.
I agree with others that I just fundamentally don't see how their business works out. They've created zero loyalty among their non-employee-employees (drivers), such that any ridesharing company that pays more will grab them very quickly. There is a little 'stickiness' among consumers who really despise installing new apps, but that reluctance can be overcome if a new competitor offers better ride pricing. As soon as Uber tries to increase prices to break even, their riders will flee. If they cut driver reimbursements, their drivers will flee. They're stuck in an expectations trap that they've created.
(As an aside: I think their future competition is local, not national or international. Now that the formula has been established, I'd look for city-specific ride hailing networks with very low overhead. Put together a cookie-cutter dispatching app, get some drivers, and work out from a limited geographic area—maybe a really gentrified downtown area with limited parking—doing a lot of locally targeted ads. Wouldn't be hard to get funding for "the next Uber" once people see a bunch of newly-minted billionaires walking around after the IPO.)
They claim their long-term play is self-driving cars, but it's not clear that's a feasible goal technologically—results have been mixed, so far, and regulatory bodies may be very reluctant to move forward at the speed Uber et al want them to, and might require 'safety drivers' for many years to come just on principle (and as a makework jobs program and de facto tax; see also: gas station attendants in NJ and OR).
If they were making money hand over fist from ridesharing, and then turning around and pumping the profits into self-driving R&D, that might make sense. In that scenario they could potentially develop an IP portfolio that would make them valuable in the self-driving future, at least as a target for acquisition by Ford/Tesla/GM/whatever. But they aren't making any money to fund something like that, instead they are losing money on their main line of business, and R&D is just pushing them further into the red. I don't know how tolerant investors are going to be of spending money on top of big quarterly losses, on a Hail Mary play that might not work at all. I'd look for them to sell off their R&D division (Uber Advanced Technologies Division) sooner rather than later, and then you'll know that the bust-out has begun.
posted by Kadin2048 at 8:30 AM on May 10, 2019 [8 favorites]
Looks dumb AF to me... except: there are presumably a lot of insiders within Uber who are sitting on great gobs of pre-IPO shares that aren't hugely liquid and want to cash out. They want to unload their shares in a way that won't depress the price, which might happen on the private markets that have been set up for such things, and going public lets them do that.
So the benefit isn't really to the company per se, it's to the current owners of the company who get to exit. And will presumably be safely away from the wreckage when it finally goes down.
I agree with others that I just fundamentally don't see how their business works out. They've created zero loyalty among their non-employee-employees (drivers), such that any ridesharing company that pays more will grab them very quickly. There is a little 'stickiness' among consumers who really despise installing new apps, but that reluctance can be overcome if a new competitor offers better ride pricing. As soon as Uber tries to increase prices to break even, their riders will flee. If they cut driver reimbursements, their drivers will flee. They're stuck in an expectations trap that they've created.
(As an aside: I think their future competition is local, not national or international. Now that the formula has been established, I'd look for city-specific ride hailing networks with very low overhead. Put together a cookie-cutter dispatching app, get some drivers, and work out from a limited geographic area—maybe a really gentrified downtown area with limited parking—doing a lot of locally targeted ads. Wouldn't be hard to get funding for "the next Uber" once people see a bunch of newly-minted billionaires walking around after the IPO.)
They claim their long-term play is self-driving cars, but it's not clear that's a feasible goal technologically—results have been mixed, so far, and regulatory bodies may be very reluctant to move forward at the speed Uber et al want them to, and might require 'safety drivers' for many years to come just on principle (and as a makework jobs program and de facto tax; see also: gas station attendants in NJ and OR).
If they were making money hand over fist from ridesharing, and then turning around and pumping the profits into self-driving R&D, that might make sense. In that scenario they could potentially develop an IP portfolio that would make them valuable in the self-driving future, at least as a target for acquisition by Ford/Tesla/GM/whatever. But they aren't making any money to fund something like that, instead they are losing money on their main line of business, and R&D is just pushing them further into the red. I don't know how tolerant investors are going to be of spending money on top of big quarterly losses, on a Hail Mary play that might not work at all. I'd look for them to sell off their R&D division (Uber Advanced Technologies Division) sooner rather than later, and then you'll know that the bust-out has begun.
posted by Kadin2048 at 8:30 AM on May 10, 2019 [8 favorites]
They may want to be a monopoly, but they have no way of achieving that because of their own exploitative model. By the very nature of not claiming to have employees, their drivers can easily choose to pick up rides from a company that pays them better, and riders can just as easily switch to those other companies. Even if they succeed in destroying public transportation, they can't control the resulting larger market. If they drive one competitor out of the market, the moment they raise prices a new one can appear for the price of a few coders and lure away the drivers. Anyone can become a driver just by owning a recent enough car -- and Uber does not control the car production.
posted by tavella at 8:39 AM on May 10, 2019 [5 favorites]
posted by tavella at 8:39 AM on May 10, 2019 [5 favorites]
So the benefit isn't really to the company per se, it's to the current owners of the company who get to exit.
It's Groupon 2.0. Where's Pud and FuckedCompany.com when you need him?
posted by JoeZydeco at 8:40 AM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]
It's Groupon 2.0. Where's Pud and FuckedCompany.com when you need him?
posted by JoeZydeco at 8:40 AM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]
An IPO question: Will Uber be selling its shares - the first round of selling, directly from the company, not subsequent market trading - at the market price today, or strictly at $45/share? I.e. will the cash the company gets from today's sale be less if the price stays below $45/share? Or have they already got their $45/share, and all the sales today are secondary?
posted by clawsoon at 8:58 AM on May 10, 2019
posted by clawsoon at 8:58 AM on May 10, 2019
I'm not sure that Uber will leave anything of value behind when it goes bust.
A lot of very high mileage Camrys.
posted by spitbull at 9:01 AM on May 10, 2019 [6 favorites]
A lot of very high mileage Camrys.
posted by spitbull at 9:01 AM on May 10, 2019 [6 favorites]
I successfully managed to avoid ever taking an Uber, but then it bought out my local bikeshare company. I thought I was doing the right thing, but Uber got me anyway. Yay.
Thing is, my local bikeshare is a non-profit, tied up with other biksehares. Still not sure what Uber's interest is in obtaining that non-profit, if it intends to hold onto it for any length of time, or generally what's up. Information has been hard to come by -- no-one is particularly forthcoming about it, other than to say the sale happened.
I really don't understand Uber's road to profitability given acquisitions like this. Something must be going on, something I can't see, but what?
posted by Capt. Renault at 9:16 AM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]
Thing is, my local bikeshare is a non-profit, tied up with other biksehares. Still not sure what Uber's interest is in obtaining that non-profit, if it intends to hold onto it for any length of time, or generally what's up. Information has been hard to come by -- no-one is particularly forthcoming about it, other than to say the sale happened.
I really don't understand Uber's road to profitability given acquisitions like this. Something must be going on, something I can't see, but what?
posted by Capt. Renault at 9:16 AM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]
180 million shares were sold at $45/share last night. The net proceeds (after brokerage fees) of 153 million shares went to the company. The other 27 million shares were sold by existing shareholders, and that money (after brokerage fees and capital gains taxes) goes to them and not the company. All the trades today are secondary - no proceeds to the company.
posted by MattD at 9:17 AM on May 10, 2019 [5 favorites]
posted by MattD at 9:17 AM on May 10, 2019 [5 favorites]
Buried in Uber's IPO filing - plans to kneecap public transportation.
If they were to succeed in supplanting some public transportation services, that's not all bad, since most public transportation requires taxpayer subsidies — a bus ride for which you pay $1 actually might actually cost $3 or $4. For Uber to kneecap the bus outfit, they'd have to be able to supply the ride for the same $1, and they'd save the taxpayers the extra $2 or $3.
To do that, my thought is that they will need to move to a jitney model of the kind that operates (on a for-profit basis) in many countries including the US, and entails flexible rather than fixed routes and stops. This is pretty much how the Uber bus in Cairo works.
posted by beagle at 9:23 AM on May 10, 2019
If they were to succeed in supplanting some public transportation services, that's not all bad, since most public transportation requires taxpayer subsidies — a bus ride for which you pay $1 actually might actually cost $3 or $4. For Uber to kneecap the bus outfit, they'd have to be able to supply the ride for the same $1, and they'd save the taxpayers the extra $2 or $3.
To do that, my thought is that they will need to move to a jitney model of the kind that operates (on a for-profit basis) in many countries including the US, and entails flexible rather than fixed routes and stops. This is pretty much how the Uber bus in Cairo works.
posted by beagle at 9:23 AM on May 10, 2019
Capt. Renault: I successfully managed to avoid ever taking an Uber, but then it bought out my local bikeshare company.
I thought that nonprofits don't have owners and thus can't be sold, though I'll admit I have limited understanding in this area. What happened in this case?
posted by clawsoon at 9:24 AM on May 10, 2019
I thought that nonprofits don't have owners and thus can't be sold, though I'll admit I have limited understanding in this area. What happened in this case?
posted by clawsoon at 9:24 AM on May 10, 2019
Taxpayer subsidies aren't bad though? That's why taxes exist, right? To pay for things that benefit everyone. Not everything has to turn a profit.
posted by ODiV at 9:25 AM on May 10, 2019 [14 favorites]
posted by ODiV at 9:25 AM on May 10, 2019 [14 favorites]
My GF is running late for our coffee date because her daughter forgot something in the car, and my GF went to the school to drop it off. How does that work with our autonomous taxi overlords ?
If the problem is forgetting things in any space you don't control, the answer isn't using a personal automobile to go everywhere, it's leaning in to agoraphobia. Or tethering stuff you're likely to drop to your bag. (And I say that as someone who had to unlock the door of a Car2Go twice after completing my trip to pick up a toilet earlier this week, to pick up stuff I'd forgotten.) Also, shout-out to the man who tapped me on the shoulder and offered me the hat I'd dropped as I was exiting the bus that evening.
Anyway, fuck Uber and its exploitation of its workers and of the general public, and fuck everyone involved in building a world where it's so difficult for a lot of people to imagine going about their days without constantly being enclosed in a three-thousand-pound mobile phone booth.
posted by asperity at 9:39 AM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]
If the problem is forgetting things in any space you don't control, the answer isn't using a personal automobile to go everywhere, it's leaning in to agoraphobia. Or tethering stuff you're likely to drop to your bag. (And I say that as someone who had to unlock the door of a Car2Go twice after completing my trip to pick up a toilet earlier this week, to pick up stuff I'd forgotten.) Also, shout-out to the man who tapped me on the shoulder and offered me the hat I'd dropped as I was exiting the bus that evening.
Anyway, fuck Uber and its exploitation of its workers and of the general public, and fuck everyone involved in building a world where it's so difficult for a lot of people to imagine going about their days without constantly being enclosed in a three-thousand-pound mobile phone booth.
posted by asperity at 9:39 AM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]
If they were to succeed in supplanting some public transportation services, that's not all bad, since most public transportation requires taxpayer subsidies — a bus ride for which you pay $1 actually might actually cost $3 or $4. For Uber to kneecap the bus outfit, they'd have to be able to supply the ride for the same $1, and they'd save the taxpayers the extra $2 or $3.
Sure, but Uber's model here seems to be less "let's find efficiencies to offer rides for a $1 and make money on out-competing public options" and more "let's take losses to offer rides for a $1 until we out-compete public options, then we can charge our actual costs + profit of much more than $4 because the public options aren't nimble enough to start back up once we've priced them out, and people will still need to commute."
posted by solotoro at 10:18 AM on May 10, 2019 [7 favorites]
Sure, but Uber's model here seems to be less "let's find efficiencies to offer rides for a $1 and make money on out-competing public options" and more "let's take losses to offer rides for a $1 until we out-compete public options, then we can charge our actual costs + profit of much more than $4 because the public options aren't nimble enough to start back up once we've priced them out, and people will still need to commute."
posted by solotoro at 10:18 AM on May 10, 2019 [7 favorites]
I don't know where Uber will end up, but I don't think local competitors will be their demise. The city of Austin outlawed Uber and Lyft for years and only recently let them back in. When I visited a few months ago, my Lyft driver told me that there were plenty of local rideshare apps, but that he didn't drive for them as all the visitors use Uber or Lyft.
posted by Triplanetary at 10:21 AM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]
posted by Triplanetary at 10:21 AM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]
Matt Levine argues the 2019iest of IPOs will not be Uber, but Chewy.com.
posted by clawsoon at 10:29 AM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by clawsoon at 10:29 AM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
plenty of local rideshare apps, but that he didn't drive for them as all the visitors use Uber or Lyft.
Wanna be a billionaire, build a rideshare bidding app!
posted by sammyo at 10:34 AM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
Wanna be a billionaire, build a rideshare bidding app!
posted by sammyo at 10:34 AM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
If the problem is forgetting things in any space you don't control
The problem isn't the forgetting things - it's the space that you control.
People like cars, in part, because they can put crap they don't use often but like to have available and have it near them if they need it. People also like their cars because they don't want to share space with other people. They want to listen to their music in their own space, and not have to deal with smelly homeless woman or Mr. GroperFlasher and such.
So, the solution to that seems to be to make public transportation private with self driving cars ? Self driving taxis don't solve the congestion problem - the cars take up the same space, roughly, as cars do. And it's not as though people are suddenly going to rideshare them - people hate that.
So, what is the upside ? Reduced cost ? I'm not sure that I see that happening.
And, even if it's a workable solution for many in places like Urban Denver or Downtown Manhattan, where the density can (in theory, rush hours exist!) guarantee reasonably fast response times, how does it work in places like Kearney, MO or Wausau, WI - where the density just isn't high enough to get those response times down ? Fully half or more of the country lives in towns like that.
People like their cars - because they are private, convenient, and reasonably low cost (given certain parameters). Uber's plan for robot taxis promise to be neither private nor convenient. I'm not convinced that the cost savings will materialize.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 10:59 AM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]
The problem isn't the forgetting things - it's the space that you control.
People like cars, in part, because they can put crap they don't use often but like to have available and have it near them if they need it. People also like their cars because they don't want to share space with other people. They want to listen to their music in their own space, and not have to deal with smelly homeless woman or Mr. GroperFlasher and such.
So, the solution to that seems to be to make public transportation private with self driving cars ? Self driving taxis don't solve the congestion problem - the cars take up the same space, roughly, as cars do. And it's not as though people are suddenly going to rideshare them - people hate that.
So, what is the upside ? Reduced cost ? I'm not sure that I see that happening.
And, even if it's a workable solution for many in places like Urban Denver or Downtown Manhattan, where the density can (in theory, rush hours exist!) guarantee reasonably fast response times, how does it work in places like Kearney, MO or Wausau, WI - where the density just isn't high enough to get those response times down ? Fully half or more of the country lives in towns like that.
People like their cars - because they are private, convenient, and reasonably low cost (given certain parameters). Uber's plan for robot taxis promise to be neither private nor convenient. I'm not convinced that the cost savings will materialize.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 10:59 AM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]
Matt Levine argues the 2019iest of IPOs will not be Uber, but Chewy.com.
I can't believe that someone got paid to write that. Har har har, the original dot com boom was dumb because people bought stuff for their pets online. Like that is crazy, but the number of dog sitting and hotel locations popping up in the US is totally normal. Comically unprofitable? I mean, $268m is 7% of $3.5 billion. GM lost more in 2Q 2018, so their loss may be a loss, but it's a normal loss, not a comical one.
posted by The_Vegetables at 11:05 AM on May 10, 2019
I can't believe that someone got paid to write that. Har har har, the original dot com boom was dumb because people bought stuff for their pets online. Like that is crazy, but the number of dog sitting and hotel locations popping up in the US is totally normal. Comically unprofitable? I mean, $268m is 7% of $3.5 billion. GM lost more in 2Q 2018, so their loss may be a loss, but it's a normal loss, not a comical one.
posted by The_Vegetables at 11:05 AM on May 10, 2019
guarantee reasonably fast response times, how does it work in places like Kearney, MO or Wausau, WI - where the density just isn't high enough to get those response times down ?
What is 'a reasonably fast response time' compared to? I mean, prior to Uber, these places had (probably crappy) public transit and no taxi service at all.
posted by The_Vegetables at 11:07 AM on May 10, 2019
What is 'a reasonably fast response time' compared to? I mean, prior to Uber, these places had (probably crappy) public transit and no taxi service at all.
posted by The_Vegetables at 11:07 AM on May 10, 2019
since most public transportation requires taxpayer subsidies — a bus ride for which you pay $1 actually might actually cost $3 or $4.
"I like to pay taxes. With them I buy civilization." - Oliver Wendell Holmes.
If they were to succeed in supplanting some public transportation services, that's not all bad
No, that's all bad, since a good part of the point of having a damn government is that it is beholden to We The People. Uber is beholden to nothing but its bottom line and investors.
As ODiV says, not everything has to turn a profit.
posted by soundguy99 at 11:50 AM on May 10, 2019 [11 favorites]
"I like to pay taxes. With them I buy civilization." - Oliver Wendell Holmes.
If they were to succeed in supplanting some public transportation services, that's not all bad
No, that's all bad, since a good part of the point of having a damn government is that it is beholden to We The People. Uber is beholden to nothing but its bottom line and investors.
As ODiV says, not everything has to turn a profit.
posted by soundguy99 at 11:50 AM on May 10, 2019 [11 favorites]
Not to mention that the reasonably low cost of vehicle ownership that Pogo_Fuzzybut mentions is also subsidized and the negative impacts of it are socialized.
posted by ODiV at 11:59 AM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]
posted by ODiV at 11:59 AM on May 10, 2019 [2 favorites]
my Lyft driver told me that there were plenty of local rideshare apps, but that he didn't drive for them as all the visitors use Uber or Lyft.
That's perhaps the case in a city like Austin, which I suppose has a lot of visitors, and where most permanent residents have cars (I assume). But in SF, NYC, or even DC, I don't know that you'd run into the same problem; you could pretty easily target permanent residents who don't have cars and who make a lot of ridesharing trips. You'd want to do some market research to find out where those people live, but my guess is that they're pretty concentrated.
Anyway, the friction of installing a new ridesharing app only goes so far. Lyft proved that; if people just refused to install more than one ride-sharing app, it wouldn't exist and couldn't have been successful. But it does and it was (at least to some definition of 'success' that may not be sustainable any more than Uber). But give people a free ride or two and they'll download your app.
I'm no fan of Uber but I don't see ridesharing going away. The prices are artificially low right now, so enjoy it while you can, but even when prices come up enough to cover costs, it'll still be part of the urban and suburban transportation landscape. (I am less bullish on the idea of self-driving cars.) And it's possible that it might complement some types of public transportation.
Studies on the effect of ridesharing on public transit are mixed. It seems to help some systems but hurt others. Cities with underutilized public transit seem to get a boost, probably because Uber/Lyft solve the last-mile problem of getting to a transit station. Cities with fully-utilized transit systems seem to get a decline in ridership, perhaps because ridesharing is generally regarded as preferable to riding in a crowded bus or train car.
What I find very surprising is that ridesharing seems to hurt rail-based transit and increase ridership of bus transit. That seems totally backwards to me, and not at all what I'd expect; I'd have thought you'd see more people taking rideshare as an alternative to the bus (because buses move at the same or slower speeds, because of traffic and stops), and using rideshare to get to train stations (which, in some traffic conditions, can get you around faster). Yet that's not what the data seems to show. I tend to wonder if the effect of ridesharing isn't being masked by other issues—deferred maintenance leading to service outages, which are crippling on rail routes (see Metrorail's 20-year low in ridership in the DC area)—that came to a head at about the same time that the ridesharing companies moved in.
posted by Kadin2048 at 12:03 PM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]
That's perhaps the case in a city like Austin, which I suppose has a lot of visitors, and where most permanent residents have cars (I assume). But in SF, NYC, or even DC, I don't know that you'd run into the same problem; you could pretty easily target permanent residents who don't have cars and who make a lot of ridesharing trips. You'd want to do some market research to find out where those people live, but my guess is that they're pretty concentrated.
Anyway, the friction of installing a new ridesharing app only goes so far. Lyft proved that; if people just refused to install more than one ride-sharing app, it wouldn't exist and couldn't have been successful. But it does and it was (at least to some definition of 'success' that may not be sustainable any more than Uber). But give people a free ride or two and they'll download your app.
I'm no fan of Uber but I don't see ridesharing going away. The prices are artificially low right now, so enjoy it while you can, but even when prices come up enough to cover costs, it'll still be part of the urban and suburban transportation landscape. (I am less bullish on the idea of self-driving cars.) And it's possible that it might complement some types of public transportation.
Studies on the effect of ridesharing on public transit are mixed. It seems to help some systems but hurt others. Cities with underutilized public transit seem to get a boost, probably because Uber/Lyft solve the last-mile problem of getting to a transit station. Cities with fully-utilized transit systems seem to get a decline in ridership, perhaps because ridesharing is generally regarded as preferable to riding in a crowded bus or train car.
What I find very surprising is that ridesharing seems to hurt rail-based transit and increase ridership of bus transit. That seems totally backwards to me, and not at all what I'd expect; I'd have thought you'd see more people taking rideshare as an alternative to the bus (because buses move at the same or slower speeds, because of traffic and stops), and using rideshare to get to train stations (which, in some traffic conditions, can get you around faster). Yet that's not what the data seems to show. I tend to wonder if the effect of ridesharing isn't being masked by other issues—deferred maintenance leading to service outages, which are crippling on rail routes (see Metrorail's 20-year low in ridership in the DC area)—that came to a head at about the same time that the ridesharing companies moved in.
posted by Kadin2048 at 12:03 PM on May 10, 2019 [3 favorites]
Make the money and promptly relocate out of California and screw the state out of income taxes for the full multihack disruptor of the universe country club humble brag!
posted by Fupped Duck at 12:08 PM on May 10, 2019
posted by Fupped Duck at 12:08 PM on May 10, 2019
What is 'a reasonably fast response time' compared to? I mean, prior to Uber, these places had (probably crappy) public transit and no taxi service at all.
So, the AV Taxi fleet works how ? Those places don't have the density of population that makes taxi services super viable (they might exist, but limits apply), and other public transportation is a non-starter. Sure, the labor costs are a big chunk of that and the maintenance and other costs are still non-zero.
As it stands, people have their own cars, which are right there and immediately available. (also, the other things I noted above). And the cost calculus is the same - the labor is free (the time is spent regardless) and the maintenance costs are borne by the user.
If the cost difference between private car and a fleet car isn't so large as to make up for the convenience difference, people won't choose to use it.
And all of that is leaving aside that there currently does not exist a general purpose autonomous vehicle, even as a prototype - that tech is so far off, I don't see it happening in the next 10 years.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 12:10 PM on May 10, 2019
So, the AV Taxi fleet works how ? Those places don't have the density of population that makes taxi services super viable (they might exist, but limits apply), and other public transportation is a non-starter. Sure, the labor costs are a big chunk of that and the maintenance and other costs are still non-zero.
As it stands, people have their own cars, which are right there and immediately available. (also, the other things I noted above). And the cost calculus is the same - the labor is free (the time is spent regardless) and the maintenance costs are borne by the user.
If the cost difference between private car and a fleet car isn't so large as to make up for the convenience difference, people won't choose to use it.
And all of that is leaving aside that there currently does not exist a general purpose autonomous vehicle, even as a prototype - that tech is so far off, I don't see it happening in the next 10 years.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 12:10 PM on May 10, 2019
The city of Austin outlawed Uber and Lyft for years and only recently let them back in.
That's, um, simplifying things greatly - Austin (and Houston) grew concerned about assault and other crimes committed by Uber & Lyft drivers because those companies let pretty much any warm body drive for them (as in, predators basically got paid to go on the prowl), so the cities created local laws requiring more stringent background checks. Uber claimed they couldn't afford that and they had their own background check system that was just fine and tried to overturn the laws via ballot measure. That got roundly defeated, so Uber & Lyft pulled out of those cities and spent the next year-ish lobbying the Republican-dominated Texas state government for a state-wide "regulation" (HB100) that lo and behold didn't have those pesky fingerprinting and background check requirements and that over-rode any local regulations. So then Uber and Lyft returned to Austin.
Texas Is Close to Overturning Austin’s Uber Rules.
So, yeah, Austin definitely has some ride-share options other cities don't have, specifically because the city government tried to limit the Uber/Lyft dominance, which let some other companies (and a non-profit) grow.
posted by soundguy99 at 12:18 PM on May 10, 2019 [11 favorites]
That's, um, simplifying things greatly - Austin (and Houston) grew concerned about assault and other crimes committed by Uber & Lyft drivers because those companies let pretty much any warm body drive for them (as in, predators basically got paid to go on the prowl), so the cities created local laws requiring more stringent background checks. Uber claimed they couldn't afford that and they had their own background check system that was just fine and tried to overturn the laws via ballot measure. That got roundly defeated, so Uber & Lyft pulled out of those cities and spent the next year-ish lobbying the Republican-dominated Texas state government for a state-wide "regulation" (HB100) that lo and behold didn't have those pesky fingerprinting and background check requirements and that over-rode any local regulations. So then Uber and Lyft returned to Austin.
Texas Is Close to Overturning Austin’s Uber Rules.
So, yeah, Austin definitely has some ride-share options other cities don't have, specifically because the city government tried to limit the Uber/Lyft dominance, which let some other companies (and a non-profit) grow.
posted by soundguy99 at 12:18 PM on May 10, 2019 [11 favorites]
People like cars, in part, because they can put crap they don't use often but like to have available and have it near them if they need it.
I've had people who don't understand why I carry so many things with me at all times (travel mug, water bottle, eating utensils, notebook, reading book, sweater, sometimes an umbrella). They are inevitably people with a car (with more stuff in it) and/or an office which holds everything. I now have an office, and my bag is half the size it used to be. But I still need to carry everything else with me that people keep in their car.
posted by jb at 12:24 PM on May 10, 2019 [4 favorites]
I've had people who don't understand why I carry so many things with me at all times (travel mug, water bottle, eating utensils, notebook, reading book, sweater, sometimes an umbrella). They are inevitably people with a car (with more stuff in it) and/or an office which holds everything. I now have an office, and my bag is half the size it used to be. But I still need to carry everything else with me that people keep in their car.
posted by jb at 12:24 PM on May 10, 2019 [4 favorites]
Transit scales. Ride-hailing doesn't. Car-related subsidies of all sorts are becoming harder to sustain.
It's not as if "people like cars!" is a thing that needs explaining in a world with automobile advertising saturating literally every television broadcast. We all know what the advantages of taking up that much public space are; it's impossible to miss. The disadvantages of the system don't get nearly as much air time.
posted by asperity at 12:45 PM on May 10, 2019 [5 favorites]
It's not as if "people like cars!" is a thing that needs explaining in a world with automobile advertising saturating literally every television broadcast. We all know what the advantages of taking up that much public space are; it's impossible to miss. The disadvantages of the system don't get nearly as much air time.
posted by asperity at 12:45 PM on May 10, 2019 [5 favorites]
I'm not saying that the system as currently realized is sustainable. It's clearly broken and getting brokener.
I just don't think Uber's proposed solution is going to do anything to address those issues, and in fact will probably make them worse. I'm not even sure how they are going to make a profit.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 1:24 PM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
I just don't think Uber's proposed solution is going to do anything to address those issues, and in fact will probably make them worse. I'm not even sure how they are going to make a profit.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 1:24 PM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
If they were to succeed in supplanting some public transportation services, that's not all bad, since most public transportation requires taxpayer subsidies — a bus ride for which you pay $1 actually might actually cost $3 or $4. For Uber to kneecap the bus outfit, they'd have to be able to supply the ride for the same $1, and they'd save the taxpayers the extra $2 or $3.
If only, although I think that would still be net bad considering how inefficient individual rides are. Instead, DC's public transit system is subsidizing Uber and Lyft to the tune of $3/ride because they don't want to offer late-night service.
posted by Copronymus at 1:30 PM on May 10, 2019
If only, although I think that would still be net bad considering how inefficient individual rides are. Instead, DC's public transit system is subsidizing Uber and Lyft to the tune of $3/ride because they don't want to offer late-night service.
posted by Copronymus at 1:30 PM on May 10, 2019
Late-night service seems like one time that ride-sharing might make as much sense as transit. The roads are empty, and most of the buses and streetcars are empty, too.
I have no data to back that up, though, so I'm not sure if it would still make sense if you crunched all the numbers.
posted by clawsoon at 1:39 PM on May 10, 2019
I have no data to back that up, though, so I'm not sure if it would still make sense if you crunched all the numbers.
posted by clawsoon at 1:39 PM on May 10, 2019
More good news: Uber wipes out $655 million of investor wealth in its opening day
posted by clawsoon at 2:02 PM on May 10, 2019 [5 favorites]
posted by clawsoon at 2:02 PM on May 10, 2019 [5 favorites]
Elwood, you appear not to know what "demand" means in the context of a market.
Oh, I see what you're trying to say: Tenant demand for parking spaces in declining - not that they are "demanding fewer parking spaces per expected headcount."
Though, while I now understand what you're trying to say, I can't say my experience meets your assertion. I've found that parking is less available and accordingly more expensive. This doesn't appear to be driven by fewer people owning cars, however, but by rising office rents being offset by offering fewer parking spaces.
posted by elwoodwiles at 5:19 PM on May 10, 2019
Oh, I see what you're trying to say: Tenant demand for parking spaces in declining - not that they are "demanding fewer parking spaces per expected headcount."
Though, while I now understand what you're trying to say, I can't say my experience meets your assertion. I've found that parking is less available and accordingly more expensive. This doesn't appear to be driven by fewer people owning cars, however, but by rising office rents being offset by offering fewer parking spaces.
posted by elwoodwiles at 5:19 PM on May 10, 2019
Uber wipes out $655 million of investor wealth in its opening day
Yes, but the good news is that having floated another 150 million shares, next quarter's loss per share will be lower -- maybe.
Uber can spin this in their quarterly call as "loss dilution."
posted by JackFlash at 5:45 PM on May 10, 2019
Yes, but the good news is that having floated another 150 million shares, next quarter's loss per share will be lower -- maybe.
Uber can spin this in their quarterly call as "loss dilution."
posted by JackFlash at 5:45 PM on May 10, 2019
Yeah using ride-sharing for late-night service kinda makes sense; there's a point where driving 15 tons of bus around doesn't, and it's probably when the number of passengers on it are few enough that they could fit in a regular passenger car or two. Less wear and tear on the bus fleet, less diesel fuel burned, less emissions, and the passengers get where they want to go faster because it's a direct route. Win-win.
Though seriously when I'm dictator of the world all transit systems will be required to run until the bars close plus one hour. So many miles on the Beer Scooter would be avoided.
posted by Kadin2048 at 7:41 PM on May 10, 2019 [4 favorites]
Though seriously when I'm dictator of the world all transit systems will be required to run until the bars close plus one hour. So many miles on the Beer Scooter would be avoided.
posted by Kadin2048 at 7:41 PM on May 10, 2019 [4 favorites]
More good news: Uber wipes out $655 million of investor wealth in its opening day
The news is even "better", although I doubt the rich will be losing sleep. The article is calculating only what buyers of the IPO at $45 lost. If you assume that every shareholder thought their shares were worth $45 last night (giving the company a valuation of $75.5 billion), then today the shareholders cumulatively lost $5.75 billion (today the stock closed down 7.6% of $45) - ie now it's worth $70 billion. (These numbers are all based on the linked article, and I haven't tried to verify em otherwise)
posted by sylvanshine at 8:12 PM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
The news is even "better", although I doubt the rich will be losing sleep. The article is calculating only what buyers of the IPO at $45 lost. If you assume that every shareholder thought their shares were worth $45 last night (giving the company a valuation of $75.5 billion), then today the shareholders cumulatively lost $5.75 billion (today the stock closed down 7.6% of $45) - ie now it's worth $70 billion. (These numbers are all based on the linked article, and I haven't tried to verify em otherwise)
posted by sylvanshine at 8:12 PM on May 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
Late-night service seems like one time that ride-sharing might make as much sense as transit.
Yeah using ride-sharing for late-night service kinda makes sense; there's a point where driving 15 tons of bus around doesn't, and it's probably when the number of passengers on it are few enough that they could fit in a regular passenger car or two. Less wear and tear on the bus fleet, less diesel fuel burned, less emissions, and the passengers get where they want to go faster because it's a direct route.
I mean, you guys . . . .
As someone who has used my city's public transpo (mostly bus, but some rail) through necessity and would love to use it more regularly if they ran more routes more often, I'm gonna refuse to even seriously consider this proposition (rideshare is more "efficient" at certain times) until municipalities, states, and the Feds properly fund and allocate public transportation resources.
From Feb of this year: Consultant calls RTA bus service efficient and overstrained Money quotes:
less diesel fuel burned, less emissions,
Even here in podunk Cleveland, nearly a quarter of our bus fleet runs on natural gas. (I have no idea how the use & production of natural gas plays out in the larger picture of helping with climate change, but in terms of reducing local emissions this seems a solved problem as long as the political will and funding is there.)
driving 15 tons of bus around
Minibus. They cost like $70 to 90 thousand, Cleveland already uses several as part of their Paratransit program, switch to minibuses after midnight (or, hell, use them all the time for certain routes), done deal.
all transit systems will be required to run until the bars close plus one hour.
Uh, it can definitely take more than an hour to close down after last call, and what about workers who show up to clean places after they close.
I don't mean to attack y'all specifically, and I'll admit I'm kinda venting a little bit, things I maybe shoulda said in the last couple public transportation threads, but seriously - Step One of "fixing" public transportation should be "Buy more vehicles, hire more people, run more routes more often and 24 hrs."
Until places have put forth a serious effort to try this simple basic idea, and have proven that it doesn't work, I'm not interested at all in whatever sexy ideas private corporations come up with.
posted by soundguy99 at 7:40 AM on May 11, 2019 [10 favorites]
Yeah using ride-sharing for late-night service kinda makes sense; there's a point where driving 15 tons of bus around doesn't, and it's probably when the number of passengers on it are few enough that they could fit in a regular passenger car or two. Less wear and tear on the bus fleet, less diesel fuel burned, less emissions, and the passengers get where they want to go faster because it's a direct route.
I mean, you guys . . . .
As someone who has used my city's public transpo (mostly bus, but some rail) through necessity and would love to use it more regularly if they ran more routes more often, I'm gonna refuse to even seriously consider this proposition (rideshare is more "efficient" at certain times) until municipalities, states, and the Feds properly fund and allocate public transportation resources.
From Feb of this year: Consultant calls RTA bus service efficient and overstrained Money quotes:
“It isn’t able to be very satisfying to anyone. It’s being asked to do too many things with too small a budget.”Unchanged since the 1970's !!!1!!11!!
"State aid for transit has plummeted in recent years. In 2017, the state cut a deal with Medicaid that stopped counties and transit authorities from charging sales tax on the federal agency’s payments for managed care. The change cost RTA about seven percent of its yearly revenue, currently about $278 million per year."
"Leaders have commissioned the studies partly to weigh whether to ask voters in 2020 to boost the authority’s 1 percent sales tax, unchanged since RTA’s birth in the mid-1970s."
less diesel fuel burned, less emissions,
Even here in podunk Cleveland, nearly a quarter of our bus fleet runs on natural gas. (I have no idea how the use & production of natural gas plays out in the larger picture of helping with climate change, but in terms of reducing local emissions this seems a solved problem as long as the political will and funding is there.)
driving 15 tons of bus around
Minibus. They cost like $70 to 90 thousand, Cleveland already uses several as part of their Paratransit program, switch to minibuses after midnight (or, hell, use them all the time for certain routes), done deal.
all transit systems will be required to run until the bars close plus one hour.
Uh, it can definitely take more than an hour to close down after last call, and what about workers who show up to clean places after they close.
I don't mean to attack y'all specifically, and I'll admit I'm kinda venting a little bit, things I maybe shoulda said in the last couple public transportation threads, but seriously - Step One of "fixing" public transportation should be "Buy more vehicles, hire more people, run more routes more often and 24 hrs."
Until places have put forth a serious effort to try this simple basic idea, and have proven that it doesn't work, I'm not interested at all in whatever sexy ideas private corporations come up with.
posted by soundguy99 at 7:40 AM on May 11, 2019 [10 favorites]
A new study funded by the San Francisco County Transportation Authority indicates that ride sharing by Uber and Lyft is responsible for at least half of the increase in traffic congestion in San Francisco since 2010. (The other half is just more people.)
Seems reasonable. Driving a car to work and parking it causes less congestion than having cars cruising around all day looking for riders. And making single occupant travel more convenient than public mass transportation also increases the number of cars on the street.
Uber may reduce the need for parking spaces but it makes traffic congestion worse. Ride sharing is not the solution to city traffic.
posted by JackFlash at 11:18 AM on May 11, 2019 [5 favorites]
Seems reasonable. Driving a car to work and parking it causes less congestion than having cars cruising around all day looking for riders. And making single occupant travel more convenient than public mass transportation also increases the number of cars on the street.
Uber may reduce the need for parking spaces but it makes traffic congestion worse. Ride sharing is not the solution to city traffic.
posted by JackFlash at 11:18 AM on May 11, 2019 [5 favorites]
Reminds me of the Facebook IPO. Many analysts and finance professors were skeptical - Facebook was sold for $38 at IPO and rapidly fell to $28. They would need to grow their revenues by 40% compounded each year for the next 10 years to justify their market value. I thought it was ridiculous.
Today Facebook is worth $180+ per share and we are all eating our hats.
Facebook was making $1bn a year in profits at its IPO. Yes, that valuation priced in a huge amount of growth, but it was at least clear how they make their money. At IPO they had a P/E ratio of over 100.
Over the last few years the stock price has grown more slowly than earnings / share which is what you would expect as the price depends on a combination of current earnings and forecast earnings growth and as they've grown, future growth expectations have decreased. FB is now in the high 20s P/E which is normal for a mature tech company. That's where Microsoft is trading now, MS was at 7 in 2007, slowly climbed to P/E 15 in 2014 and has then increased quite rapidly in the last few years. Probably that's investors starting to believe that MS has cracked their business model in the post-home-desktop-computer world and pricing in some cloud growth.
Anyway, big difference between an aggressive growth forecast and no clear route to profitability.
posted by atrazine at 1:08 PM on May 11, 2019 [3 favorites]
Today Facebook is worth $180+ per share and we are all eating our hats.
Facebook was making $1bn a year in profits at its IPO. Yes, that valuation priced in a huge amount of growth, but it was at least clear how they make their money. At IPO they had a P/E ratio of over 100.
Over the last few years the stock price has grown more slowly than earnings / share which is what you would expect as the price depends on a combination of current earnings and forecast earnings growth and as they've grown, future growth expectations have decreased. FB is now in the high 20s P/E which is normal for a mature tech company. That's where Microsoft is trading now, MS was at 7 in 2007, slowly climbed to P/E 15 in 2014 and has then increased quite rapidly in the last few years. Probably that's investors starting to believe that MS has cracked their business model in the post-home-desktop-computer world and pricing in some cloud growth.
Anyway, big difference between an aggressive growth forecast and no clear route to profitability.
posted by atrazine at 1:08 PM on May 11, 2019 [3 favorites]
thefool: One of the first times I've been tempted to learn how to short a stock.
So far you would've been doing very well.
It would be interesting to know how many of the ~180 million shares in the IPO are still sitting in the hands of the buyers who got them at $45.
posted by clawsoon at 2:31 PM on May 13, 2019
So far you would've been doing very well.
It would be interesting to know how many of the ~180 million shares in the IPO are still sitting in the hands of the buyers who got them at $45.
posted by clawsoon at 2:31 PM on May 13, 2019
By the numbers: Uber's massive IPO sinks investors
I'm curious if this will affect the whole recent trend to companies delaying going public by raising easy private equity. In the 2000s a company like Uber would have gone public (or broke) years earlier. But the trend in the 2010s has been to these massive massive private financing rounds like Uber's $7.7B round from the Vision Fund end of 2017. That's part of the private investment that's now underwater; they may never be able to cash out at a profit.
posted by Nelson at 3:15 PM on May 13, 2019 [2 favorites]
A whopping 81% of the $29.55 billion in equity that Uber has raised is underwater. IPO investors have lost $655 million, while investors from 2016 and 2018 have between them lost $2.27 billion.Note this was written Sunday, before today's trading Uber went down a further 10% today. A followup article from Axios notes that in part this is just unlucky timing. But it's also a significant loss.
I'm curious if this will affect the whole recent trend to companies delaying going public by raising easy private equity. In the 2000s a company like Uber would have gone public (or broke) years earlier. But the trend in the 2010s has been to these massive massive private financing rounds like Uber's $7.7B round from the Vision Fund end of 2017. That's part of the private investment that's now underwater; they may never be able to cash out at a profit.
posted by Nelson at 3:15 PM on May 13, 2019 [2 favorites]
Nelson: By the numbers: Uber's massive IPO sinks investors
posted by clawsoon at 12:00 PM on May 14, 2019
Uber is the ultimate minotaur — a company where billions of dollars of private-market funding were supposed to create a self-fulfilling prophecy of dominance and market power.Umm... whoever coined that does know what happened to the Minotaur, right?
posted by clawsoon at 12:00 PM on May 14, 2019
For those of you continuing to follow this story via Activity, there's ... well, is delightful too much of a schadenfreude'y word? ... news.
Leslie Picker, CNBC: Uber underwriters worried about the IPO deployed unusual ‘naked short’ tactic to support the stock
Matt Levine, in his most recent Money Stuff column at Bloomberg, points out that:
Leslie Picker, CNBC: Uber underwriters worried about the IPO deployed unusual ‘naked short’ tactic to support the stock
Matt Levine, in his most recent Money Stuff column at Bloomberg, points out that:
The other awkward thing is of course that the underwriters made money on their naked short; the more the stock went down, the more money they made. (And the bigger their naked short was—the more sure they were that the stock would go down—the more money they made.) This is not the point of the trade; as far as Uber’s underwriters are concerned, the naked short was a noble and self-sacrificing effort, done at considerable risk to themselves, to stabilize the stock and protect the interests of their issuer and investor clients. But, yeah, they made money on it. Depending on how big the naked short was and when they covered it, it’s quite plausible that Uber’s underwriters made more in trading profits than their $106.2 million underwriting fees.posted by RedOrGreen at 2:09 PM on May 15, 2019 [3 favorites]
If you were … inclined to be critical … you would characterize this as Uber’s underwriters talking up the stock to their investing clients, telling them that there was lots of demand at $45, and then pricing the deal there, while at the same time quietly betting their own money that the stock would fall immediately. They sold stock to their customers while betting against that stock, and then that bet turned out to be correct and they made many millions of dollars on it. I cannot stress enough that that was not the subjective experience of Uber’s bankers, who undoubtedly—for their own careers, for their relationships with investors and issuers, for their reputations as skilled bankers—wanted this deal to go differently. But it kind of is what happened, oops. At least they got the money.
I just want to point out that minibuses are terrible for accessibility. High steps and maddeningly slow chair lifts even relative to the already slow ramps on modern kneeling buses make them suboptimal for everyone.
They're cheap because they are terrible. If paratransit service wasn't uniformly terrible it wouldn't be such a huge deal, but it is, so not only is non-existent, inaccessible, or poorly accessible transit exclusionary, it also places an enormous time and organizational burden on people who already have enough obstacles in their lives. Transit isn't just good for our cities, it's a human rights issue. Mobility is a basic need in modern society, and scheduling trips at least a day in advance for a 2 hour pickup window to spend an hour each way to go see your doctor who is only a 10 minute fixed route bus ride away does not satisfy that need. It's already bad enough how much of our major cities, much less nearly the entirety of the rest of the country, are inaccessible by public transportation of any sort whatsoever except a particularly accommodating Uber/Lyft driver, which hardly counts since you've no way back.
posted by wierdo at 2:33 PM on May 15, 2019 [3 favorites]
They're cheap because they are terrible. If paratransit service wasn't uniformly terrible it wouldn't be such a huge deal, but it is, so not only is non-existent, inaccessible, or poorly accessible transit exclusionary, it also places an enormous time and organizational burden on people who already have enough obstacles in their lives. Transit isn't just good for our cities, it's a human rights issue. Mobility is a basic need in modern society, and scheduling trips at least a day in advance for a 2 hour pickup window to spend an hour each way to go see your doctor who is only a 10 minute fixed route bus ride away does not satisfy that need. It's already bad enough how much of our major cities, much less nearly the entirety of the rest of the country, are inaccessible by public transportation of any sort whatsoever except a particularly accommodating Uber/Lyft driver, which hardly counts since you've no way back.
posted by wierdo at 2:33 PM on May 15, 2019 [3 favorites]
Uber rang in its IPO with champagne and mimosas. Then the hangover began. (WaPo)
posted by peeedro at 11:48 AM on May 17, 2019 [2 favorites]
Still, while Uber’s senior executives were away in New York for the company’s $82 billion IPO, staffers at the San Francisco headquarters and elsewhere were drinking in the offices to celebrate the company’s stock listing, which made some of them rich. Despite warnings from the company in its invitation to “Keep it Classy,” one executive assistant handed in her resignation after a verbal outburst and dispute with colleagues during the celebrations, according to current and former employees with direct knowledge of the incident. A party at one California satellite office was shut down, according to one of the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation.Still a garbage fire.
posted by peeedro at 11:48 AM on May 17, 2019 [2 favorites]
Only tangentially related but interesting: Uber, Lyft drivers manipulate fares at Reagan National causing artificial price surges:
posted by peeedro at 1:32 PM on May 20, 2019 [3 favorites]
Every night, several times a night, Uber and Lyft drivers at Reagan National Airport simultaneously turn off their ride share apps for a minute or two to trick the app into thinking there are no drivers available---creating a price surge. When the fare goes high enough, the drivers turn their apps back on and lock into the higher fare.When the algorithm controls how much food you can put on your family, you're going to look for ways to break the algorithm.
posted by peeedro at 1:32 PM on May 20, 2019 [3 favorites]
Every night, several times a night, Uber and Lyft drivers at Reagan National Airport simultaneously turn off their ride share apps for a minute or two to trick the app into thinking there are no drivers available---creating a price surge. When the fare goes high enough, the drivers turn their apps back on and lock into the higher fare.
That's amazing. Collective action at work.
posted by clawsoon at 2:08 PM on May 20, 2019
That's amazing. Collective action at work.
posted by clawsoon at 2:08 PM on May 20, 2019
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Yet the decision makers and the money are in the US market.
This normalization of the "American" as the host user interface culture for Rest of the World not worth customizing for (Nokia could do it) is reaching its limit as the dissonance between the American consumption driven marketing fed "reality"/zeitgeist/cloud, and the Rest of the World's more climate change impact oriented one due to the daily reality of the changing climate.
We aren't even sticking our fingers in our ears going la la la but you making us do it with the stream of content flooding the technology; its infrastructure; and its user interface/s.
posted by hugbucket at 4:38 AM on May 10, 2019 [7 favorites]