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"Uber is just waiting until driverless cars are a thing and then they will own transportation." I hear this all the time, but realisticly that's at least a deca
by PatentTroll 10y ago
"Uber is just waiting until driverless cars are a thing and then they will own transportation." I hear this all the time, but realisticly that's at least a decade away. Are Ubers investors prepared to pour $24bn into the company waiting for this nirvana? They certainly could, but I'm not so sure they will.
- hashberry 10y agoRealistically, Uber faces major competition from Google and Apple, both who are investing heavily in self-driving cars and have easy access to loyal consumers.
- up_and_up 10y ago> Google ... loyal consumers Name one physical consumer product that has garnered them loyal customers? Apple on the other hand...
- dragonwriter 10y ago> Name one physical consumer product that has garnered them loyal customers? Transportation is a service, not a physical consumer product. Google has plenty of consumer services (including some "meatspace" services, like Google Express) that have garnered them loyal customers. EDIT: But perhaps most relevantly to competing with or commoditizing Uber, Google has Google Maps, which not only has a huge user base, but already has a ridesharing button in it. Now, AFAIK, all that does right now is give an estimated Uber price and a link out to the Uber app -- but its a fairly trivial move for Google either to include their own autonomous car service (if they launch one) or other Uber competitors in that link, and either eat Uber's business directly or at least weaken Uber's moat.
- petra 10y agoyou're correct. Google maps has added new options to it's ridesharing:"New partners include 99Taxis in Brazil, Ola Cabs in India, Hailo in the U.K. and Spain, mytaxi in Germany and Spain and Gett in the U.K. They will sit alongside listings from Uber," Also, don't forget Google now surfacing a notification saying: "would you a half price shared taxi for your predicted route ? click to open Google maps" - sounds like a great way to form new habits for users.
- csours 10y agoNexus Phone users. I've re-upped for each of my phones after my first Nexus.
- untog 10y agoI'm a Nexus user too, but Nexus usage is a rounding error in overall Android figures.
- hashberry 10y agoDude... Chromebook. I love Chromebooks and have them all over my house. Better than a tablet, less expensive than a laptop.
- joe_the_user 10y agoNot to mention that if you wind-up with a bunch of fully autonomous vehicles whose owners put them up for hire, that market might look utterly different from the current market for rides and so Uber's "first mover advantage" is rather hypothetical - like a company that rents horses to buggy drivers saying "wait till we have cars, then I'll be profitable, I won't have to pay anything for horse!"
- LordHumungous 10y agoA decade is being generous. Early adopters maybe by then but they'll be sharing the road with human driven cars for a long time to come. It's not clear to me how Uber profits from this scenario. My sense is that driverless cars are the shiny dangly toy that Uber is using to distract investors. But maybe I'm being too pessimistic.
- kamaal 10y agoMy guess is the 'low hanging fruit' part of self driving AI is now done. The real part has to now follow. And it will be a few decades before we see anything decent.