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It looks like Washio was operating in a lot of cities. None of the others are operating in more than two markets. They're all presumably burning cash trying to
by bcherry 10y ago
It looks like Washio was operating in a lot of cities. None of the others are operating in more than two markets.
They're all presumably burning cash trying to establish themselves in the market, but Washio was probably burning the fastest due to their rapid expansion. They also raised a little more money than the others, which probably encouraged them to expand faster.
It's just a matter of time before the others run out of cash. They're all hoping that they'll be able reach the scale they need to turn a profit before the money train runs out. With Washio's closure, they must know that fundraising is going to be very hard, so you'll probably not see much more expansion in this space for a little while. Instead, they'll all work on increasing efficiencies and saturating existing markets, then try to leverage that into another round of funding to expand to more markets before the competition.
- in_cahoots 10y agoThis seems to be a pattern I see with many on-demand startups: Phase 1: Achieve growth at any cost, promise profits when scale increases Phase 2: Slow down growth to achieve profits, promise scaling when profits increase Phase 3: Fail to achieve either scale or profits, close down or pivot to more lucrative market. With the exception of Uber, are there any logistics startups that have avoided Phase 3?