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Uber Turns to Saudi Arabia for $3.5B Cash Infusion

nytimes.com

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Re: Uber Turns to Saudi Arabia for $3.5B Cash Infusion

#91

Post by cc439 »

nugget wrote: post #38
rexreed wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's only Fat city if there's an exit at that valuation. We're talking Theranos style valuations here that can disappear at any time. They better find an exit scenario before the music stops or it's a world of hurt, especially for the later stage investors.

The only thing that can ''take out'' Uber is widespread adoption of autonomous vehicles, whereupon ride sharing becomes a physical-capital intensive business (cars) rather than the current human-capital intensive business (drivers/their driver network). Autonomous vehicles (and the infrastructure to support them) significantly reduce the amazing network efforts that Uber has enjoyed to date. An investment into Uber a…

>The only thing that can ''take out'' Uber is widespread adoption of autonomous vehicles

Or their customers losing interest as driver/fare subsidies are slowly dialed back. I've already begun planning on Uber with hesitation as I have now twice been left "stranded" for ~30 minutes without an active driver available in my city.

I'm fine with the surge pricing which comes along with that but Uber is becoming increasingly unattractive to drivers and that's a real problem alongside increasing fares. Most of the casual drivers who fuelled Uber's early explosive growth are long gone now that the true costs of using your personal vehicle as a taxi became clear. Even the dedicated drivers are staying in on weekdays because Uber oversaturated the driver pool in small markets while cutting back on payouts. There aren't enough riders on a Tuesday evening for more than 1-2 drivers to dedicate their time and when those 1-2 call it a night, there's no one willing to stay up for a single $7 fare.

Re: Uber Turns to Saudi Arabia for $3.5B Cash Infusion

#92

Post by [deleted] »

nemedse wrote: post #52
godembodied wrote: post #32

So what if they execute people for what they think are crimes? Who are you to judge what people should or should not do? What you label as evil someone will label as good. There is no absolute evil/good, as you're trying to portray it. It only your opinion vs. their opinion.

How can you seriously think that? Do you think that crucifying someone for taking part in pro-democratic protests is not universally bad? Why not let our government do it? If they label it as good, who are we to judge ...

[deleted]

Re: Uber Turns to Saudi Arabia for $3.5B Cash Infusion

#94

Post by nemedse »

godembodied wrote: post #75
nemedse wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How can you seriously think that? Do you think that crucifying someone for taking part in pro-democratic protests is not universally bad? Why not let our government do it? If they label it as good, who are we to judge ...

How can it be universally bad? Gravity is universal, but morals are relative to individual and groups of individuals(societies). You grew up in the environment where action X is labeled as bad and then you take that so seriously and think it's an objective fact about the world(a universal law), when it's just your point of view.

I don't want to argue about what is accepted in Saudi Arabia and what is not. But we are talking about a company from the US, which is not stuck in the middle ages AFAIK. It is totally unacceptable that they accept money from, and at the end of the day, provide more money to this dictatorship that goes against the core values of western civilisation.

Re: Uber Turns to Saudi Arabia for $3.5B Cash Infusion

#95

Post by cylinder »

linkregister wrote: post #56
kinkdr wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my simplistic mind, their business model is to spend a lot of money today in order to create a monopoly tomorrow.

If you look at the Uber blogs and public statements, the company is far more ambitious than simply being the ride sharer with the largest market share. The company's vision is to make transportation as seamless and reliable as running water. They have other projects going on right now, such as delivery truck automation and self-driving cars. I would consider them to be competing not only with Lyft but also with Hertz…

Please, this is all hype to capture investors. What does Uber have other than money that gives them an advantage in self driving cars? Having users doesn't matter either. Google could add self driving taxi summoning to Google Maps overnight and we'd all be using it.

Re: Uber Turns to Saudi Arabia for $3.5B Cash Infusion

#96

Post by ng12 »

cylinder wrote: post #87
methehack wrote: post #82

I've always been a little confused about uber's capital needs. When I first heard about uber, the part I thought was super-clever was that you wouldn't _need_ lots of capital because all the drivers would have their own cars. Leveraging the latent capital of one side of the two-sided market was the genius of it. (Airbnb too) Same for the staffing -- hook up both sides of the market. No need to pay anyone out of your…

Exactly. They are burning cash to gain market share and will lose that share as soon as they stop. Not many barriers to these apps. Uber is going to implode.

Here's the thing -- ride sharing is the least interesting thing about Uber. Uber's expertise is on-demand logistics which is a totally new field at this scale. Ride sharing just happened to be an easy first step. Once they're able to move things around in real-time at a global scale the opportunities are massive.

Re: Uber Turns to Saudi Arabia for $3.5B Cash Infusion

#97

Post by enahs-sf »

methehack wrote: post #82

I've always been a little confused about uber's capital needs. When I first heard about uber, the part I thought was super-clever was that you wouldn't _need_ lots of capital because all the drivers would have their own cars. Leveraging the latent capital of one side of the two-sided market was the genius of it. (Airbnb too) Same for the staffing -- hook up both sides of the market. No need to pay anyone out of your…

I think fare subsidy plays a large role, but I think it's both driver and customer acquisition across every market in the world. It's gotta be very expensive for them to recruit people to become drivers.

Re: Uber Turns to Saudi Arabia for $3.5B Cash Infusion

#98

Post by downandout »

methehack wrote: post #82

I've always been a little confused about uber's capital needs. When I first heard about uber, the part I thought was super-clever was that you wouldn't _need_ lots of capital because all the drivers would have their own cars. Leveraging the latent capital of one side of the two-sided market was the genius of it. (Airbnb too) Same for the staffing -- hook up both sides of the market. No need to pay anyone out of your…

I believe that your assumption of insane driver subsidies is indeed the reason they are sucking down so much money. That is a problem, because the moment that people have to pay the actual costs of an Uber ride, they may go back to taxis or driving their own cars.

The only strategy I can see with the absurd amounts they are raising is that they are trying to get enough money to sustain the subsidies until they kill all existing competition, at which point they can raise their prices and people will have no choice but to pay them - much like Standard Oil did. In today's world though, I'm not sure that such a strategy can work.

It will be interesting to see what happens. Perhaps there is a chance of success. But if Uber were a public company, personally I'd be shorting every share that I could.

Re: Uber Turns to Saudi Arabia for $3.5B Cash Infusion

#99

Post by rconti »

Animats wrote: post #48

Latest Uber worry: When the Tesla 3 comes out, Uber drivers clogging the fast-charging stations. "Free power for life" is a great deal when you're a cab.

Elon has always said "access to supercharging". Never said free. Supercharging is a high speed charging process via their stations (I think 440v). The price is completely separate from whether or not you can perform the action.
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