321–330 of 413 posts
The author forgot another significant problem Uber faces. When self driving fleets can be deployed for ride sharing, a new startup, one without the hundred of millions / billions in losses that Uber will have accumulated, will come on the scene. How can Uber, a company with massive losses to recover from, compete with a new, nimble and well-funded startup that doesn't have those legacy losses weighing down their abil…
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I'm not sure why a Level 3 needs to be a person in the vehicle? Uber may time their IPO just before they start having growth problems. That seems to have a high probability. The contrarian side of me thinks that the more negative people become about a tech company the more likely it is to succeed (assuming a real product and not elaborate fraud.) Markets become far more favorable when all of your competitors believe…
"Is Uber/Lyft the starting point for calling a car or is it Android/iOS ; or is it Google Maps/Apple Maps ; or may be it is Siri/Alexa/etc." - This is an extremely good and often overlooked point. With Apple, Google, and Amazon now offering AI-powered smart-home devices (i.e., Google Home, Alexa) as well as mobile assistants like Siri and Android Assistant, they will increasingly own the first point of contact for a…
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> Airlines lost those regulations under Reagan Actually it was under Carter -- he pushed for it, spurred by Alfred Kahn whom he appointed to the CAB: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airline_Deregulation_Act Carter was also the one who chose Volker to head the fed and squeeze inflation (to kill stagflation). This cost Carter the election because it also squeezed the economy...but ignited a recovery that Reagan got credi…
It's fascinating how many things that started under Carter people misremember and attribute solely to Reagan. We really do reform our memories to conform to simple stories
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Brick and mortar stores were (and still are) extremely weak competition. That's why Amazon utterly crushed many of them and continues to do so. Not just small mom and pops either. Borders, which at one point was one of the largest bookstore chains in the nation, shuttered its doors because it didn't switch to an online model fast enough. Barnes and Noble at some point was in deep trouble as well.
Last numbers I saw had online sales across all categories at less than 10% of total retail sales. Hardly "weak competition." https://ycharts.com/indicators/ecommerce_sales_as_percent_re... (Note: that growth is still a good reason to be bullish about Amazon!)
All auto sales, gas purchases, alcohol & tobacco, heavy industrial equipment (commercial farm equipment, etc) are included in that category.
Online sales only being 10% of that still probably looks massively outsized if you're drilling down to B&M clothing & electronics purchases. I haven't made a B&M retail purchase any more times than I can count on one hand since 2004.
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For an IPO, Uber would have to publish real audited GAAP financials. Those would look terrible. Uber's over-valuation would not survive.
You're naive if you don't think Uber already has audited financials. Investors wouldn't dump billions in if they didn't.
[0] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-11-07/banks-sai...
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Put snarkily: Paid subscription models don't lead to hockey sticks. And investors are only interested in hockey sticks. There's so much in our world we could do if we only demanded profit, rather than 20+% profit YoY from every corner of our existence.
Novice here, why don't subscriptions lead to hockey sticks? Which business model does?
The business models that lead to hockey sticks are anything where the initial use is free to the user. Essentially, how Google, Facebook, and Twitter all started. They can use advertising to monetize that growth, and eventually ancillary paid services (Google Drive storage for example).
The commercial airline industry has lost money over the whole of its existence. If I'm flying from NYC to DAL, I'm flying the cheapest carrier (with a slight nod to Frequent Flyer programs). I'm not sure how Uber, Lyft, etc are any different than Southwest, American, etc. Cab companies (which I hate) and airlines saw this years ago and promoted regulations to protect their fees (and, thereby, wages). Airlines lost th…
I live in Singapore and Uber is a little cheaper than the excellent cab services which operated here even before Uber. There is a big competitor to Uber here called Grab. I switched to Uber because their service is good, drivers are gracious and cars are nice and they give me good offers. Last year I took 300 Uber rides, never once taking the usual Comfort Delgro Cab because their drivers suck. If prices were the sam…
I lived a short while in Chiang Mai Thailand. At the time Uber was just getting started and Grab was WAY better than Uber. I really wanted to like Uber there, but after about 5 times of the drivers 1. not finding me (yes, even with GPS), 2. not showing up at all after a long time waiting, or 3. not knowing where they were going.. I gave up. It seemed that they lacked training and that they were mostly trying to get t…
That said, the Uber was reasonably cheap, quick and friendly, so their service seems to have improved there.
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Yeah, that's one big one. It's really anyone with a dependent that has equipment needs (car seats, hockey gear, etc.) "But, but, you can rent a car with a car seat!" That response ignores the fact that there are 4 different major categories of car seats, most kids need a specific one at different times of their lives, and if you have multiple kids you need the specific combination of seats. And of course, car seat in…
A car seat that can be adjusted into different sizes sounds like a minor part of the R&D needed for Ubertopia.