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Uber's Still Not Profitable

pluralistic.net

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Re: Uber's Still Not Profitable

#51

Post by bergenty »

ginko wrote: post #16
elisharobinson wrote: post #10

i am not siding with Uber but to claim that they are going to fail is a bit of hyperbole . the value proposition is quite simple for both drivers and passengers . for drivers you would make more income by driving more consistently , for passengers you get a cab instead of shouting like a cave-person on the street. It is true that there is an element of bezzle with money pumping and dumping over the last few years . T…

>for passengers you get a cab instead of shouting like a cave-person on the street. Maybe I'm a cave person but to me just waving to hail a cab or just entering the first car in line at a taxi stand seems much more convenient than having to fiddle around with a mobile app and wait until it arrives.

Maybe if you live in the very heart of big cities. Otherwise there’s no way most of the US can flag a taxis. Uber replaced limo service which costs atleast three times as much.

Re: Uber's Still Not Profitable

#52

Post by aetherson »

This article's tone is so over the top negative that I think it hurts its credibility. Most of its criticisms are directionally valid, but overstated.

If you dig down into the source that this article is based on ( https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2022/08/hubert-horan-can-ube... ), which is also pretty grumpy in tone but not quite as over the top, I think what you see is that Uber has genuinely improved its finances materially -- it's not all accounting tricks.

But it's still hard to see how Uber gets from here to the kind of sustainably significantly profitable place it will need to get eventually in order to justify its valuation.

Re: Uber's Still Not Profitable

#53

Post by thematrixturtle »

boudin wrote: post #35
AndyMcConachie wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where I live, Rotterdam NL, traditional taxis work pretty well. Not everywhere is as fucked up as America.

Never really understood why people use uber either until I went to Austin. They are not filling a gap in taxis in my opinion but in public transport.

In America, that's a pretty big gap.

Re: Uber's Still Not Profitable

#54

Post by preommr »

semiquaver wrote: post #38
incrudible wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The idea is that Uber will develop a self-driving car that will ultimately offset its loss leader, much like Amazon and AWS.

That was the idea once; They gave up on that part, their self driving car division has been shuttered and they don’t plan to replace it. From the article: > Uber's bag of tricks is nearing its bottom. Its fantasy of magic, self-driving robo-taxis is over (the company spent $2.5b to make a car that had a fatal crash every 0.25 miles, and then had to pay another company $400m to take the division off its hands): > http…

2.5b seems like a drop in the bucket for what would essentialy revolutionize the world of transportation.

Re: Uber's Still Not Profitable

#55

Post by waspight »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #48
mudrockbestgirl wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a fair value prop in SF, where you have to scream like a cave-person while wading through poop-filled streets with gun-wielding semi-homeless trying to mug you at each corner. Unfortunately for Uber the rest of the world doesn't look quite like that and normal taxis work just fine...

> Unfortunately for Uber the rest of the world doesn't look quite like that and normal taxis work just fine... Not in the slightest. One of the biggest problems with normal taxis in Shanghai is that they won't stop if it's raining. And it rains all the time . I don't suddenly need a taxi less if it starts to rain; if anything, I need one more.

What is the reason behind that?

Re: Uber's Still Not Profitable

#56

Post by mytailorisrich »

shreyshnaccount wrote: post #20

I don't get the endgame here. Uber provides super cheap cab rides by going into a loss so competitors don't spring up. then eventually when they've dominated the market they do what? increase prices? so competitors spring up again? makes no sense

End game of taxi industry is self-driving cars.

This is what Uber has been betting on but they estimated that the transition would come much earlier than it is.

Re: Uber's Still Not Profitable

#57

Post by imron »

elisharobinson wrote: post #10

i am not siding with Uber but to claim that they are going to fail is a bit of hyperbole . the value proposition is quite simple for both drivers and passengers . for drivers you would make more income by driving more consistently , for passengers you get a cab instead of shouting like a cave-person on the street. It is true that there is an element of bezzle with money pumping and dumping over the last few years . T…

> but to claim that they are going to fail is a bit of hyperbole

They make a loss on every ride, but don’t worry they’ll make up for it in volume!

Re: Uber's Still Not Profitable

#58

Post by snowpiercer »

Traubenfuchs wrote: post #4

I think they were really betting on autonomous driving, fueled by Elon Musks lies and hype. They built up the digital infrastructure and so much clout their company name & product became a verb on the level of googling. But now taxi-level 100% autonomous no-driving-wheel cars are farther away than ever. The current broad generation of machine learning and sensors reached its maximum and it‘s looking bleak.

Wow. ..I'm really surprised by this comment..what do you mean by "farther away than ever" . I just recently started learning to code and I really want to go into machine learning ..does it mean there isn't any major innovation right now in the field ?

Re: Uber's Still Not Profitable

#59

Post by snowpiercer »

smcl wrote: post #25
nowherebeen wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you forgetton the whole Google lawsuit against Uber? Anthony Levandowski. Uber’s self driving project is still no where near production ready.

I think you mis-read - I'm saying they did have a self-driving car project, not that they didn't . And yeah nobody has production ready self-driving tech, it wouldn't surprise me if they had canned it.

So the self driving talk was all a lie ?

Re: Uber's Still Not Profitable

#60

Post by jmeister »

imron wrote: post #57
elisharobinson wrote: post #10

i am not siding with Uber but to claim that they are going to fail is a bit of hyperbole . the value proposition is quite simple for both drivers and passengers . for drivers you would make more income by driving more consistently , for passengers you get a cab instead of shouting like a cave-person on the street. It is true that there is an element of bezzle with money pumping and dumping over the last few years . T…

> but to claim that they are going to fail is a bit of hyperbole They make a loss on every ride, but don’t worry they’ll make up for it in volume!

They could raise prices, reduce volume and turn profitable.
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