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Lyft losing as much as $50M a month, president confirms

siliconbeat.com

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Re: Lyft losing as much as $50M a month, president confirms

#31

Post by sneak »

niftich wrote: post #17
liquidise wrote: post #7

What shocks me about both Lyft and Uber's enormous burn rates are that they suggest the companies are heavily subsidizing their drivers. This subsidy is in part to spur penetration in new markets (as all marketplace apps must do), but also suggests that they have reason to believe customers will simply not pay a rate that makes the business profitable. Assuming the latter is the case, i'm not sure if they have reason…

They are absolutely excited about the time when self-driving cars will be actually here. But the real play here is to use taxi service as a pretext/generator for building up an on-demand courier service [1] with superior returns -- and performance that vastly dwarfs any incumbents. [1] https://rush.uber.com/how-it-works EDIT: after the introduction of courier services, picking up passengers serves as a baseline load…

"It's like Uber, but for Amazon"

Re: Lyft losing as much as $50M a month, president confirms

#32

Post by sneak »

yladiz wrote: post #2

I'm somewhat more optimistic that Lyft will fare better in certain cities than Uber because they seem more willing to work with governments and seem like less of a "bully" (although they did act the same as Uber in Austin recently...), but they also seem to wait until Uber goes into a city and kind of lets them take the brunt of the assault in the hopes that they will fare better. However, hearing that they're losing…

> more optimistic that Lyft will fare better

heh

Re: Lyft losing as much as $50M a month, president confirms

#33

Post by oblio »

jahnu wrote: post #26
niftich wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are absolutely excited about the time when self-driving cars will be actually here. But the real play here is to use taxi service as a pretext/generator for building up an on-demand courier service [1] with superior returns -- and performance that vastly dwarfs any incumbents. [1] https://rush.uber.com/how-it-works EDIT: after the introduction of courier services, picking up passengers serves as a baseline load…

I'm probably in the minority here but I'm not convinced we are particularly close to real self-driving cars. It's definitely possible but I strongly suspect there are more challenges ahead than most people believe.

And even if we do get self-driving cars, people forget that there will be an FDA clinic trial like process before they are allowed on the roads, which will take years.

Multiply that by the number of states/countries where you want to operate and by the level of bureaucracy in each country.

I'd say that from the day the tech actually works properly (which might be many years away, still), it will take at least 10 years for its availability across the globe, if not more.

Re: Lyft losing as much as $50M a month, president confirms

#34

Post by foota »

oblio wrote: post #33
jahnu wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm probably in the minority here but I'm not convinced we are particularly close to real self-driving cars. It's definitely possible but I strongly suspect there are more challenges ahead than most people believe.

And even if we do get self-driving cars, people forget that there will be an FDA clinic trial like process before they are allowed on the roads, which will take years. Multiply that by the number of states/countries where you want to operate and by the level of bureaucracy in each country. I'd say that from the day the tech actually works properly (which might be many years away, still), it will take at least 10 year…

Yeah, just like how rigorously Tesla's auto pilot has been vetted?

Re: Lyft losing as much as $50M a month, president confirms

#35

Post by arachnids »

argonaut wrote: post #18
liquidise wrote: post #7

What shocks me about both Lyft and Uber's enormous burn rates are that they suggest the companies are heavily subsidizing their drivers. This subsidy is in part to spur penetration in new markets (as all marketplace apps must do), but also suggests that they have reason to believe customers will simply not pay a rate that makes the business profitable. Assuming the latter is the case, i'm not sure if they have reason…

Uber claims to be profitable in the US already, and it's their massive competition with Didi in China where they're burning cash ($1B/year). http://fortune.com/2016/02/18/uber-profitable-us/

"not including “interest, taxes, and equity-based compensation for employees", so in terms of whether the company will survive / current employees will ever see payday, I don't think that means anything.

Re: Lyft losing as much as $50M a month, president confirms

#36

Post by novocaine »

jsprogrammer wrote: post #14
liquidise wrote: post #7

What shocks me about both Lyft and Uber's enormous burn rates are that they suggest the companies are heavily subsidizing their drivers. This subsidy is in part to spur penetration in new markets (as all marketplace apps must do), but also suggests that they have reason to believe customers will simply not pay a rate that makes the business profitable. Assuming the latter is the case, i'm not sure if they have reason…

Why not an arms race to burn through the other side's cash, thus gaining monopoly status for a time?

This is the simplest, most conventional business explanation and what their MBAs would be thinking.

They won't have many particular incumbent advantages if / when self driving cars arrive; all their carefully tuned business model, investment and product is about how to handle human drivers.

Re: Lyft losing as much as $50M a month, president confirms

#38

Post by ForHackernews »

stormbrew wrote: post #10
liquidise wrote: post #7

What shocks me about both Lyft and Uber's enormous burn rates are that they suggest the companies are heavily subsidizing their drivers. This subsidy is in part to spur penetration in new markets (as all marketplace apps must do), but also suggests that they have reason to believe customers will simply not pay a rate that makes the business profitable. Assuming the latter is the case, i'm not sure if they have reason…

I think the play is more or less to strangle the higher priced and over-regulated patchwork taxi industries and build a more uniform national/international regulatory framework that's more amenable to these kinds of businesses. At that point prices will probably rise, and (they hope, and I think they're right) customers will see value in the better product that keeps them in.

> customers will see value in the better product that keeps them in.

How is Uber a "better product" than a taxi? As far as I can tell, it's competing on price, and that's it. If cabs were the same price as Uber, I would take a taxi every time.

Re: Lyft losing as much as $50M a month, president confirms

#39

Post by puranjay »

jahnu wrote: post #26
niftich wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are absolutely excited about the time when self-driving cars will be actually here. But the real play here is to use taxi service as a pretext/generator for building up an on-demand courier service [1] with superior returns -- and performance that vastly dwarfs any incumbents. [1] https://rush.uber.com/how-it-works EDIT: after the introduction of courier services, picking up passengers serves as a baseline load…

I'm probably in the minority here but I'm not convinced we are particularly close to real self-driving cars. It's definitely possible but I strongly suspect there are more challenges ahead than most people believe.

I feel that the hype for self-driving cars is the same as it was for VR in the 90s

We had to wait another 15-20 years for those feverished VR dreams to become a reality

I reckon it'll be the same for self-driving. We are 20-25 years away, not 5-10

Re: Lyft losing as much as $50M a month, president confirms

#40

Post by wildmusings »

oblio wrote: post #33
jahnu wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm probably in the minority here but I'm not convinced we are particularly close to real self-driving cars. It's definitely possible but I strongly suspect there are more challenges ahead than most people believe.

And even if we do get self-driving cars, people forget that there will be an FDA clinic trial like process before they are allowed on the roads, which will take years. Multiply that by the number of states/countries where you want to operate and by the level of bureaucracy in each country. I'd say that from the day the tech actually works properly (which might be many years away, still), it will take at least 10 year…

The number of people who die every year in car accidents is so massive that any big regulatory hold-up for automated cars, which would almost without a doubt reduce deaths by at least an order of magnitude, is politically untenable.
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