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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

#191

Post by nyc8821227 »

alttab wrote: post #183
morgante wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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. There doesn't seem to be evidence of that. Uber is apparently profitable in its mature markets (mainly the US).[0] The money is mostly used to prop up new markets, where you have to give lots of incentives to get both sides of the market in place fast (keeping supply a…

I got some blood testing machines I'd love to sell you.

I laughed out loud when I read this

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

#192

Post by madebylaw »

morgante wrote: post #173
downandout wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 a…

> 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. There doesn't seem to be evidence of that. Uber is apparently profitable in its mature markets (mainly the US).[0] The money is mostly used to prop up new markets, where you have to give lots of incentives to get both sides of the market in place fast (keeping supply a…

Uber and Lyft are paying their largest referral bonuses in the "mature" markets (major US cities, e.g. $750 in Chicago recently). They are churning and burning part-time giggers who leave after the bonus is earned or the incentive expires.

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

#193

Post by madebylaw »

tlrobinson wrote: post #127
downandout wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 a…

> The only strategy I can see A more cynical version: they're trying to pump up their valuation, IPO, and dump their stock before anyone notices.

This investment didn't change their valuation.

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

#194

Post by sjg007 »

mikeash wrote: post #111
CPLX wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People say this a lot, so I am not picking on you, but I don't get this argument at all. Amazon does it, so does Lasership and Seamless and Fedex and WalMart and a million other variations. I don't see any real reason Uber is more adept at adjacent non-core market verticals than any other top tier entrant.

Don't forget Domino's. They and others in their business had this whole thing with drivers using their own cars for short notice transportation jobs decades ago.

It's like uber for pizza.

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

#195

Post by slackstation »

I think this is a bridge until the driver-less car can be developed. Once they hit the market, automation will take over but, that same automation will allow for a company with hyper-thin margins or people to loan out their car to a service that transports people.

Uber wants to be that company but, there's nothing really stopping the market from having 50+ companies like Uber in it.

There will probably be marketplaces that aggregate these smaller services into larger competitive exchanges with spot prices for a ride.

If that's the case, it seems like it might take an awful long to make back the billions that Uber is pumping to make markets around the world.

On the bright side, everyone has cheaper transportation.

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

#196

Post by discardorama »

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…

> So where's all this cash going? Is the driver side being subsidized to a ridiculous degree still (this is, actually, my guess)?

I was in India recently. The driver said that when Uber started out, they'd give each driver Rs. 60K/mo (about $1000/mo) just to sign in for 10 hours/day, even if they did not give a single ride. Now, Uber pays by the number of rides and not a portion of the actual fares. So, for example, he said that Uber pays them Rs. 3500 for 17 rides. Most of my rides were about Rs 100 each; so Uber was taking a loss on each ride. But their system of paying by the ride is a genius idea: it removes the incentive for the driver to dick around and do a TSP around the city to drive up the fare. Now its in their interest to get the ride over with as quickly as possible, so they take the most direct route.

Edit: Sorry, "Rs" is the Indian currency, Rupee. There's about 65 Rupees to the USD.

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

#197

Post by cmurf »

macspoofing wrote: post #158
loeg wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can split an Uber 4 ways but you can't split a bus fare. So if you go out with a few friends it becomes much more reasonable for short trips. If Uber gets more expensive, some people will go back to public transit.

>You can split an Uber 4 ways but you can't split a bus fare. Like a taxi? Uber will never come close to moving the sheer numbers that public transit does. You can't do it, not enough road to fit all those cars. Especially in downtown cores. So Uber competes with public transit as much as taxis compete with public transit.

Taxis are a kind of public transit. So call me skeptical if Uber manages to sink taxis and this is part of their long term strategy, because unless they have enough money to become the sovereign in their dominant markets, they're going to end up being regulated by the local government should they supplant taxis.

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

#198

Post by zatkin »

discardorama wrote: post #196
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…

> So where's all this cash going? Is the driver side being subsidized to a ridiculous degree still (this is, actually, my guess)? I was in India recently. The driver said that when Uber started out, they'd give each driver Rs. 60K/mo (about $1000/mo) just to sign in for 10 hours/day, even if they did not give a single ride. Now, Uber pays by the number of rides and not a portion of the actual fares. So, for example,…

What does "Rs." mean?

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

#199

Post by TaylorSwift »

zatkin wrote: post #198
discardorama wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So where's all this cash going? Is the driver side being subsidized to a ridiculous degree still (this is, actually, my guess)? I was in India recently. The driver said that when Uber started out, they'd give each driver Rs. 60K/mo (about $1000/mo) just to sign in for 10 hours/day, even if they did not give a single ride. Now, Uber pays by the number of rides and not a portion of the actual fares. So, for example,…

What does "Rs." mean?

Rupees, the Indian Rupee. Currency.

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

#200

Post by [deleted] »

zatkin wrote: post #198
discardorama wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So where's all this cash going? Is the driver side being subsidized to a ridiculous degree still (this is, actually, my guess)? I was in India recently. The driver said that when Uber started out, they'd give each driver Rs. 60K/mo (about $1000/mo) just to sign in for 10 hours/day, even if they did not give a single ride. Now, Uber pays by the number of rides and not a portion of the actual fares. So, for example,…

What does "Rs." mean?

[deleted]
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