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Why I don't believe in Uber's Success

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Re: Why I don't believe in Uber's Success

#391

Post by exelius »

komali2 wrote: post #161
exelius wrote: post #110

I think Uber's business model relies on self-driving cars. They're paying subsidies now to build a brand -- the name "Uber" has become synonymous with "pull out your cell phone and call for a ride" -- that will be very valuable once self-driving taxis become a commodity (which will happen shortly after their introduction). Uber is not a bet on who can build the most profitable taxi company now -- it's a bet on a bran…

Agreed, and the author even sets us up for this - again and again he mentions how the largest sink is the drivers, the largest cost is the drivers, the biggest blocker is the drivers. Remove the drivers from the equation and things suddenly become a lot simpler. Imagine if instead of becoming an uber driver, you retrofit your car with an Uber Automated Car Taxi Converter(c), "guaranteed to put your car to work for yo…

> Imagine if instead of becoming an uber driver, you retrofit your car with an Uber Automated Car Taxi Converter(c), "guaranteed to put your car to work for you!"

No way; see my comments above about the differences in car design. Combining electric vehicles and autonomous driving is a HUGE combination that trades mechanical complexity (difficult to diagnose, time intensive, permanent fixes are extremely costly) for software complexity (less deterministic but can easily be patched). This greatly reduces both the initial cost and the maintenance costs of electric vehicles (really, the only thing you have to swap out are the tires). Reduction in fleet maintenance costs alone is huge. My theory is that the Tesla Model S only costs as much as it does because they're using it as a premium option to fund R&D of the self-driving auto platform. I'd bet if we saw the total marginal cost for a Model S it would be SIGNIFICANTLY lower than a comparable internal combustion / hybrid automobile.

Your current car is also designed at least partially for driver comfort. If you no longer need a driver, then you no longer need a steering wheel, or control of any kind really... and you can offer a completely different transportation experience. Do you even need a windshield? What happens to the interior of the auto as VR/AR gain popularity?

But I'm pretty sure whatever the future of the car is, your current auto won't be along for the ride. I'm not even sure that individual auto ownership will make sense anymore -- companies with large fleets will almost certainly be able to offer various levels of guaranteed pickup times. If you're wealthy and want your own car, you would just pay more for a "dedicated" car instead of a "shared" one.

Re: Why I don't believe in Uber's Success

#392

Post by beambot »

busterarm wrote: post #325
beambot wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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!)

If you look into the indicators that fall into the Retail and Services sales category, there are extremely big ticket items and high-volume items that aren't sold in high volume or at all due to regulation. 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 outsi…

Your spending habits may not be representative of the greater population.

Re: Why I don't believe in Uber's Success

#393

Post by btilly »

1_2__3 wrote: post #291
btilly wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is possible thanks to Chapter 11 bankruptcy. In most countries when you go bankrupt, you go out of business. In the US you usually go into Chapter 11. This lets you default on some of your debt, renegotiate contracts, and then come out of bankruptcy stronger than before. The problem with this is shown with airlines. They would all make a profit if they could just lose some of them. Unfortunately whenever that lo…

That... Doesn't match history at all. Mergers have been far more dominant in recent years than bankruptcies, but you ignore them completely.

It is a very large piece of the long-term puzzle for how airlines are still in business despite having lost money consistently.

http://www.npr.org/2011/11/29/142909836/is-bankruptcy-busine...

That said, consolidation through mergers has happened recently. We will see how that plays out going forward.

Re: Why I don't believe in Uber's Success

#394

Post by wolf550e »

tedunangst wrote: post #229
tptacek wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazon's position in the market is so weird that Matt Levine calls it a charity for the American consumer sponsored by the stock market. But it's at least clear how Amazon could generate money long-term; if it wasn't, nobody would invest in it.

I think you mean Yglesias?

Yes, Levine quoted Yglesias

https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2016-12-02/quant-awa...

http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2013/04/12/amazon_as_cor...

Re: Why I don't believe in Uber's Success

#395

Post by gmarx »

gumby wrote: post #275
gmarx wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

Carter's decision to do this reminds me of Johnson's comment about "losing the south for a generation" with the civil rights act. Despite the stereotype, typically the economy sucks under republicans and is repaired by democrat (Eisenhower is an exception, and Roosevelt took a while to figure out what to do, but I did say "generally"). Remember the concern under Clinton that the national debt might be retired and wha…

perhaps but if you look at per capita growth over the past hundred plus years in the US, aside from the great depression, you see pretty uniform growth no matter which party is in office. Also, the Clinton debt thing is overblown (my opinion) all that happened was a shift from public to private borrowing and I don't see what positive effect that had, temporary though it was. The whole Clinton miracle was a combination of coming out of a recession into an investment bubble.

Re: Why I don't believe in Uber's Success

#396

Post by gmarx »

hackerboos wrote: post #324
gmarx wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

Iranian hostage crisis comes to mind.

Really? I was alive at the time and the hostage crisis remains indelibly linked to Carter in my mind (aside from the belief of many on the left that Reagan cut some kind of deal with Iran to hold the hostages until after he won).

Do younger people recall it differently?

Re: Why I don't believe in Uber's Success

#397

Post by gumby »

gmarx wrote: post #395
gumby wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Carter's decision to do this reminds me of Johnson's comment about "losing the south for a generation" with the civil rights act. Despite the stereotype, typically the economy sucks under republicans and is repaired by democrat (Eisenhower is an exception, and Roosevelt took a while to figure out what to do, but I did say "generally"). Remember the concern under Clinton that the national debt might be retired and wha…

perhaps but if you look at per capita growth over the past hundred plus years in the US, aside from the great depression, you see pretty uniform growth no matter which party is in office. Also, the Clinton debt thing is overblown (my opinion) all that happened was a shift from public to private borrowing and I don't see what positive effect that had, temporary though it was. The whole Clinton miracle was a combinatio…

Indeed, I was making a gross generalization to point out the inanity of the stereotype "Republicans strong on defense and good for business". Thanks for looking up the statistics.

> Also, the Clinton debt thing is overblown (my opinion)

Well I think it's creditable that there was a willingness not to increase the debt simply because it was easier to service (different under Reagan and Bush jr). Though it's congress that borrows, not the executive, right?

Re: Why I don't believe in Uber's Success

#398

Post by _Codemonkeyism »

rockostrich wrote: post #384
_Codemonkeyism wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since Amazon seems to have shifted to generate profit instead of subsidizing prices, it went downhill (at least in Berlin). Amazon Logistics is a huge pain (several lost packages, Saturday and 8pm delivery to business) and the prices of most goods at Amazon is mediocre. As a very good and Amazon customer for a very long time, I've reached the point to jump to something else should it materialize.

While I haven't experienced this sort of thing very often in the US, whenever it does happen Amazon has either sent another package, refunded the cost of the order, and/or offered a free month of Prime. And it usually only takes 5-10 minutes in an online chat with customer service to figure out. There are definitely plenty of meh things about Amazon, but customer service is certainly not one of them.

YMMV, I'm not happy if paying for Prime and 50% of packages get lost, I call, and get them some days later than expected or get them later as expected and payed for next day delivery in the first time.

Re: Why I don't believe in Uber's Success

#399

Post by sctb »

1_2__3 wrote: post #297
Keyframe wrote: post #22

I don't understand his point. Maybe I'm dense (today, ha). If Uber has a (simplified) split cost per drive consisting of vehicle (+maintenance) and/or fuel & driver. If subsidised part is generally covering the driver part. When you replace driver with autonomous vehicle and you remove subsidies, you're left with a sustainable (presumably) model on a certain margin that is already rolling. Rolling in a sense that it…

I love this, self-driving cars are the new magic fairies. Whatever the problem, they're here to fix them - and it'll be any minute now. Aaaaaaaaany minute now.

This qualifies as drive-by snark, which we've already asked you to please stop posting.

Re: Why I don't believe in Uber's Success

#400

Post by sk5t »

jrockway wrote: post #286
mcguire wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In 2015, Amazon made $596,000,000 on revenues of $107,006,000,000, or a profit margin of 0.6%. In 2012 and 2014, it lost money. How long should investors wait to see a real profit? Should they expect revenue growth to continue indefinitely?

How much profit should they make? If there was a machine where you could insert a 20 dollar bill and it spit out the 20 and an additional 12 cents, would you not use that machine? How much would you pay to buy one?

I dunno, how much money would you keep in a savings account that yields 0.5% APR?
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