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Uber's Loss Exceeds $800M in Q3 on $1.7B in Net Revenue

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Re: Uber's Loss Exceeds $800M in Q3 on $1.7B in Net Revenue

#21

Post by ra1n85 »

jamez1 wrote: post #15
Cyph0n wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I tried Lyft the other day, but after they charged me $25 as an "authorization hold" without notification, I cancelled my ride and decided to stick with Uber. Note that Uber's auth charge is usually around $1. $25 may not be a significant amount for some, but it's non-trivial for a college student like myself. I would have been happy had they just notified me first instead of my bank. Terrible UX to be frank. I actua…

A $25 hold for a fare that might be $15 doesn't sound unreasonable? Is ride-sharing that big of a cost for your day to day?

When you're so broke that an extra couple of dollars will put you in overdraft territory, it's not reasonable.

At least they inform you in most hotels. I have not used Lyft - I would hope they do the same.

Re: Uber's Loss Exceeds $800M in Q3 on $1.7B in Net Revenue

#22

Post by xapata »

antiviral wrote: post #6

Uber is making the rest of us in SV look terrible. 1. Collect a huge pile of money at sky-high valuations from those who really should know better. 2. Ignore any sensible unit economics and undercut local taxi/transport services until those small businesses go bankrupt since they don't have Uber's money pile. 3. Evade local regulations that everyone else follows in the name of 'innovation' even though the reality is…

> do they really think they can just permanently ignore all driving laws?

What laws do you think they'd need to permanently ignore? And no, I doubt that's their belief.

Re: Uber's Loss Exceeds $800M in Q3 on $1.7B in Net Revenue

#23

Post by fbreduc »

6t6t6t6 wrote: post #11
antiviral wrote: post #6

Uber is making the rest of us in SV look terrible. 1. Collect a huge pile of money at sky-high valuations from those who really should know better. 2. Ignore any sensible unit economics and undercut local taxi/transport services until those small businesses go bankrupt since they don't have Uber's money pile. 3. Evade local regulations that everyone else follows in the name of 'innovation' even though the reality is…

AFAIK, this is called "Dumping the market". And it should not be legal...

sure it should

Re: Uber's Loss Exceeds $800M in Q3 on $1.7B in Net Revenue

#25

Post by duaneb »

fbreduc wrote: post #23
6t6t6t6 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AFAIK, this is called "Dumping the market". And it should not be legal...

sure it should

Why? It appears to have no value to anyone but the immediate consumer. That's not a business, it's a charity. What a collossal waste of cash.

Re: Uber's Loss Exceeds $800M in Q3 on $1.7B in Net Revenue

#26

Post by ylhert »

antiviral wrote: post #6

Uber is making the rest of us in SV look terrible. 1. Collect a huge pile of money at sky-high valuations from those who really should know better. 2. Ignore any sensible unit economics and undercut local taxi/transport services until those small businesses go bankrupt since they don't have Uber's money pile. 3. Evade local regulations that everyone else follows in the name of 'innovation' even though the reality is…

Uber does background checks, not sure where the idea that they are skipping them comes from

Re: Uber's Loss Exceeds $800M in Q3 on $1.7B in Net Revenue

#28

Post by [deleted] »

xapata wrote: post #22
antiviral wrote: post #6

Uber is making the rest of us in SV look terrible. 1. Collect a huge pile of money at sky-high valuations from those who really should know better. 2. Ignore any sensible unit economics and undercut local taxi/transport services until those small businesses go bankrupt since they don't have Uber's money pile. 3. Evade local regulations that everyone else follows in the name of 'innovation' even though the reality is…

> do they really think they can just permanently ignore all driving laws? What laws do you think they'd need to permanently ignore? And no, I doubt that's their belief.

[deleted]

Re: Uber's Loss Exceeds $800M in Q3 on $1.7B in Net Revenue

#29

Post by jlarocco »

nharada wrote: post #4

Presumably this is intentional -- Uber could raise prices and make more money, but right now they're choosing to keep prices very low in order to undercut Lyft and the cab companies with the assumption that having a monopoly will return more profits in the future. At least anecdotally, here in SF Lyft is almost always more expensive than Uber.

That's such a terrible strategy I can't believe that's really what they're doing.

The short term problem is that they can't burn through money long enough for it to work. The barrier to entry to create an Uber or Lyft competitor is very low - anybody with a car and a laptop can create a viable Uber competitor. Nobody's doing it because Uber, Lyft, and taxis are everywhere, but when there's only Uber, and they're suddenly expensive, they'll get disrupted just like taxis did.

The long term problem is that even if they succeed, purposely creating a monopoly and then raising prices is illegal. It's a great way to get in even more trouble with the government.

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