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I'm really confused on what to think about Uber. My personal thinking/logic is really bearish on them, similar to the post on the front page yesterday [1]. Howe

I'm really confused on what to think about Uber. My personal thinking/logic is really bearish on them, similar to the post on the front page yesterday [1]. However, I keep seeing extremely smart/accomplished people joining it which makes me second guess my intuition. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13437414 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13437414

SixSigma 10y ago
Big $$ talk loud
- oculusthrift 10y ago
  not sure how they treat people like him but for the average engineer they don't pay great and want to force you take take equity instead of $$. really hope Amit is getting pure cash out of this deal. edit: also, im pretty sure google pay him big money.
- CalChris 10y ago
  If Singhal is motivated by money at this point then he's a straight up fool. I'm going to give this all the due regard of a Mayer going to Yahoo.
  - pyrophane 10y ago
    Why do you say that? Last I checked money still had a lot of utility in our society.
  - rifung 10y ago
    What if he were only indirectly motivated by money? Money has a lot of potential for philanthropy after all and he did say that that's where he'd like to focus.
- bduerst 10y ago
  I think Matt Levine nailed it earlier this month [1], on how Uber lost $2.2 Billion in 9 months [2]: >Eventually there will be self-driving cars, and there's no special reason to think that Uber will be the best at building them, or that its dominant position in the ride-hailing-app space will protect it from better self-driving-car businesses. Which also needs to factor in Uber's biggest liability: their attitude towards flouting laws and regulations. It worked okay for the ride-sharing markets, as municipal regulations are varied and slow to catch up, but they were forced to stop their self-driving car project after just a week because they didn't even get the necessary permits. [3] [1] https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-01-10/bank-blockchains-and-an-alibaba-box https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-01-10/bank-bloc... [2] http://www.vox.com/new-money/2017/1/9/14194202/uber-lost-22-billion-9-months http://www.vox.com/new-money/2017/1/9/14194202/uber-lost-22-... [3] https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/21/technology/san-francisco-california-uber-driverless-car-.html https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/21/technology/san-francisco-...
  - fullshark 10y ago
    I don't think their position is safe but I'd probably bet on them or google winning that market over anyone else.
    - bduerst 10y ago
      I'd bet on Google, Tesla, and Mercedes before Uber, since they all have vehicles with more than a week on the road and cash-positive revenue streams to support further development. Uber burned through ~30% of their $11B in cash just in 2016 alone.
      - fullshark 10y ago
        Uber will be able to get cash in the future if self driving tech matures to transition. It'll be a multi billion dollar opportunity, capital will be lining up to invest in the ride hailing market leader.
        10y ago
ycombini 10y ago
And there were times when extremely smart & accomplished people were joining Facebook
- jdamon96 10y ago
  What are you saying about FB?
- morgante 10y ago
  And Facebook is now a huge and profitable company... So they all made a smart move.
grandalf 10y ago
Uber has done nearly everything right. I think its main vulnerability is that its laborers are a fickle bunch and Uber hasn't done enough to inspire any loyalty. All Uber drivers I talk to alternate between Uber and Lyft and exploit any promotions or incentives either firm offers. Uber has the opportunity to revolutionize not just logistics but also on-demand employment, but has lagged in the latter, leaving the door wide open for Lyft and other services that carve out a big niche of Uber's market. I think Uber should immediately offer the following services to its drivers: - Tax planning, withholding even if it's 1099 income or if the driver has other sources of income. - Matching IRA contributions with one year vesting. - healthcare subsidy - continuing education, or some way to level up in life by driving with Uber. - Some incentive for being a loyal, exceptional driver. - Car financing/leasing/sharing and insurance packages tailored at would-be Uber drivers who don't own a vehicle. I know that more and more of these sorts of ideas are being tried by both Uber and Lyft, but investors need to realize that the workforce is being trained to be opportunistic and disloyal. Many of the drivers I've interviewed (during my ride) despise Uber the corporation or boast about their fair weather support. Many reflect back on how Uber used to be better for drivers, etc. Uber's main battles have been fought with regulators and with Lyft, but now the best strategy is figuring out how to become the Uber of on-demand employment.
- cm2012 10y ago
  They are really worried about their contractors being classified as employees. That would be an existential threat.
  - grandalf 10y ago
    I know that is Uber's view, I think it's mistaken and unsustainable. The lack of a sustainable policy is what creates the existential risk.
    - r00fus 10y ago
      Sustainability and big-bang VC startups seem to be mutually exclusive.
kelukelugames 10y ago
You should sign up for Blind and read the Uber employees' comments.
- freyir 10y ago
  Can you give the gist? You piqued my interest, but the app looks like the rabbit hole I'd rather not go down.
  - phamilton 10y ago
    There seem to be two modes. First, it seems everyone hates it there and management is terrible and people get fired with no severance all the time. The other mode is aggressive recruiting. Here's an actual interaction I had: Me: I'm torn between doing something new and staying where I'm at. Random Uber employee: Hey, you should join Uber. Hit me up and I'll refer you. Me: I can assure you I'm not interested. Random Uber employee: Wuss...
    - employee8000 10y ago
      Uber employee here, and I can tell you that almost everyone I know loves working here. I apologize for the behavior of the random douchebag employee you encountered, I would hope most of us wouldn't act like that.
      - hengheng 10y ago
        So you would be happy to refer GP? :-P
    - discreetmath 10y ago
      Is it really that easy to get a referral? I'm applying for internships and I applied to Uber (online) a while ago and have heard nothing. Meanwhile, all but one of the places I have been interviewed (Google, Amazon, etc.) were places where I friend referred me. The interview rate has been 70% for places I've been referred vs. 3% for places I haven't, so getting one has been key. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to join Blind since I don't have a work email that they're available to.
maverick_iceman 10y ago
I think self-driving cars would be a major challenge for Uber. As long as ridesharing companies need human drivers network effects ensure that Uber will remain at the top. But when driverless cars become feasible Uber's moat disappears. What's stopping an upstart company to buy/lease 10,000 self-driving cars and let them loose on the street? There's no reason for customers to prefer Uber over them. (This problem becomes more acute if Uber IPO's by then and have to worry about quarterly results but their competitor can burn through VC money.)
- Kiro 10y ago
  That's why Uber invests so heavily in self-driving cars.
- enjo 10y ago
  What investor would invest in a competitor if the market is as commoditized as you foresee? (I agree with you fwiw)
  - oculusthrift 10y ago
    no need for an investor. only need a GM or Tesla or Apple etc to decide to.
- neosat 10y ago
  "What's stopping an upstart company to buy/lease 10,000 self-driving cars and let them loose on the street?" You're right that self-driving cars would be a major challenge/opportunity. Re: what's stopping an upstart, letting self-driving cars loose on the street is inefficient. There is a huge amount learned/accrued intelligence involved in how those self driving cars are orchestrated for optimize the marketplace. So that's where a key capability is going to be important even in a world where self-driving is commoditized.
- mlmlmasd 10y ago
  > As long as ridesharing companies need human drivers network effects ensure that Uber will remain at the top. I think it is the opposite... Uber's only real way to turn a profit while staying competitive is to get rid of the cost of drivers. > What's stopping an upstart company to buy/lease 10,000 self-driving cars and let them loose on the street? The fact that Uber is already working on this, has a platform, has tons of data?
withdavidli 10y ago
Because a person is smart/ accomplished in their domain does not mean they will be in another. In this instance, people that are technology geniuses, doesn't mean they know about liquidation preferences and accounting.
- sib 10y ago
  Alternately, people who are technology geniuses and also were employee #176 at Google may not need to care about liquidation preferences and may just want to work on new and different interesting problems.
coss 10y ago
Follow the money.
cryptozeus 10y ago
I have same feeling, one my friend worked at a flywheel (uber but with taxi cabs)...he said that uber dominates this industry. They have figured out the biggest obstacle which is government regulations. This is the big challenge for any startup trying to copy uber.
- klausa 10y ago
  I wouldn't call "knowingly breaking the law and throwing VC money at the lawyers until the problem goes away" necessarily "figuring out government regulations".
  - kinkrtyavimoodh 10y ago
    It's the same thing for practical purposes if it achieves the same aim.
    - SomeStupidPoint 10y ago
      Except that your execs are one pissed off DA away from defending RICO charges. Companies undervalue low-probability, high-risk events like that.
      - aub3bhat 10y ago
        its not rico... https://www.popehat.com/2016/06/14/lawsplainer-its-not-rico-dammit/ https://www.popehat.com/2016/06/14/lawsplainer-its-not-rico-...
        SomeStupidPoint 10y ago
        My point was exactly that Uber can be construed as a criminal organization and their executives as the leaders of a large, international criminal organization who knowingly pay people to commit crimes on their behalf (that the bosses then profit from) and that their organization's primary business is the commission of such crimes. Is it still not RICO? Edit: Im pretty sure they could get money laundering related charges to stick well enough to charge (and settle or bring to trial, rather than dismissed), based on banking with money they know was earned in violation of various state and city laws. Money laundering law is bad (and so is RICO), and often can be applied in counter-intuitive ways by aggressive DAs.
pyrophane 10y ago
I don't know all that much about Mr. Singhal, so I have no idea if this may be true in his case, but I suspect that great engineers are frequently not the best judges of a company's prospects, especially when there are numerous factors other than the strength of their technology that will determine how they perform. With respect to Uber, regardless of anything else, they have lots of cash with which to compensate key hires, and plenty of interesting problems to work on. That might be enough.
- throwaway729 10y ago
  Or, more likely, they're interested in solving interesting problems and aren't afraid of losing their jobs because they've got money. That's pretty much exactly what the aft for says...
wicha 10y ago
On the flip side the Head of Economic Research of Uber left last September. You can make a weak case an insider economist could be better at predicting market success than an outsider engineer.
dangoldin 10y ago
Same here. My bear case for Uber is just that self driving will commoditize the market and turn a two sided market into a one sided market. At that point it will be the cheapest offering that wins. Wrote about it in more detail here: http://dangoldin.com/2016/05/28/uber-and-self-driving-cars/ http://dangoldin.com/2016/05/28/uber-and-self-driving-cars/
coops 10y ago
Someone like Amit doesn't need money; by the time you get as highly placed at Google as he was you will be wealthy. I believe that Uber has interesting engineering challenges but likewise have doubts about their profitability.
Eridrus 10y ago
I think there are real economies of scale in ride service. Once you have enough customers your cars are better utilised and your costs are lower, this means that while Uber's cap table may be all fucked up by the time it happens, it will lose less money competing on price than new entrants. Depending on how large these economies of scale are, even the fact that a new entrants would be doing less volume (and therefore losing more) may not be enough to help them compete.
- ctrl_freak 10y ago
  This analysis strongly suggests that there isn't economies of scale in ride service: http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2016/11/can-uber-ever-deliver-part-one-understanding-ubers-bleak-operating-economics.html http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2016/11/can-uber-ever-deliver...
  - Eridrus 10y ago
    I agree that there are no economies of scale that cause one operator to have an advantage expanding to other cities. However, in a given city, I would expect there to be economies of scale as you optimize your cars better and decrease the amount of time they have no passengers. It's most clear to me in the case of UberPOOL where the more passengers you have in total, the more likely two of them will be going in the same direction. We may not have reached a cheap enough price point yet to hit these economies. Depending on how much you trust anything Uber says, they say they are profitable in SF, and some other US metros, which the article you linked ignores. I think people are right to be a little skeptical, given how loose Uber is with the truth, but I see a possibility for them to succeed and smart people keep giving them good money so I want to give them the benefit of the doubt on the issue of actually making money eventually.
kposehn 10y ago
Uber team member here. I was skeptical for a very long time as well, but I've been won over. The challenges are fantastic, the work intense (yet I still have time for family) and I'm part of the best team I've ever been on. The last year or so has been the best of my professional life. I would highly recommend a closer look.
- newsat13 10y ago
  Very inspiring. Applying for a job now.
  - PutinIsEvil 10y ago
    You should try BumbaSoft. Nobody has heard of it yet but it's because we're a stealth focus security firm. Free food, free gym, swimming pool! Money is great. I can work from home (at will) and enjoy time with my family too. And work is the best I've ever done in my entire life!!! I'm waiting for your job application. Thanks.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- zigzigzag 10y ago
  No offence, but saying it's a great place to work doesn't really address any of the concerns people have about Uber as a sustainable business.
- amelius 10y ago
  Could you please comment on how you think the business model of Uber could sustain growth, even though transportation is essentially a commodity service? Lots of people here seem confused by this question, so it would be nice to hear an explanation from somebody inside.
- kposehn 10y ago
  A few asked why I didn't address the sustainable business question directly. I prefer to decline due to disclosure reasons as I'm a stickler for following those.
jeevand 10y ago
If you are an engineer, go interview with them. https://eng.uber.com/ https://eng.uber.com/
thkim 10y ago
I think Uber has bright future, but I really doubt about current valuation. What's looking bright for them is that they can replace their drivers with self-driving cars eventually. By then core business competency completely transforms into capital and technology which Uber has built quite a strength. Looking at what they are right now, Uber and Lyft are both pseudo technology company that haven't added that much innovation to current landscape (different markets have different experience, i.e. SF vs NYC). But can we expect huge profitability in the future? I doubt it - they have to maintain a fleet of cars which are quite expensive to maintain, and they cannot drive out competition completely (DOJ will never allow this). Bottom line? Very competitive pricing in the future, some profitability, however I doubt margin will be good.
bsn54 10y ago
The way I see it,money(capital contribution) looted by saudis by selling oil is being distributed back to the drivers and passengers of the different countries.

SixSigma 10y ago

Big $$ talk loud

oculusthrift 10y ago
not sure how they treat people like him but for the average engineer they don't pay great and want to force you take take equity instead of $$. really hope Amit is getting pure cash out of this deal. edit: also, im pretty sure google pay him big money.
CalChris 10y ago
If Singhal is motivated by money at this point then he's a straight up fool. I'm going to give this all the due regard of a Mayer going to Yahoo.
- pyrophane 10y ago
  Why do you say that? Last I checked money still had a lot of utility in our society.
- rifung 10y ago
  What if he were only indirectly motivated by money? Money has a lot of potential for philanthropy after all and he did say that that's where he'd like to focus.
bduerst 10y ago
I think Matt Levine nailed it earlier this month [1], on how Uber lost $2.2 Billion in 9 months [2]: >Eventually there will be self-driving cars, and there's no special reason to think that Uber will be the best at building them, or that its dominant position in the ride-hailing-app space will protect it from better self-driving-car businesses. Which also needs to factor in Uber's biggest liability: their attitude towards flouting laws and regulations. It worked okay for the ride-sharing markets, as municipal regulations are varied and slow to catch up, but they were forced to stop their self-driving car project after just a week because they didn't even get the necessary permits. [3] [1] https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-01-10/bank-blockchains-and-an-alibaba-box https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-01-10/bank-bloc... [2] http://www.vox.com/new-money/2017/1/9/14194202/uber-lost-22-billion-9-months http://www.vox.com/new-money/2017/1/9/14194202/uber-lost-22-... [3] https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/21/technology/san-francisco-california-uber-driverless-car-.html https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/21/technology/san-francisco-...
- fullshark 10y ago
  I don't think their position is safe but I'd probably bet on them or google winning that market over anyone else.
  - bduerst 10y ago
    I'd bet on Google, Tesla, and Mercedes before Uber, since they all have vehicles with more than a week on the road and cash-positive revenue streams to support further development. Uber burned through ~30% of their $11B in cash just in 2016 alone.
    - fullshark 10y ago
      Uber will be able to get cash in the future if self driving tech matures to transition. It'll be a multi billion dollar opportunity, capital will be lining up to invest in the ride hailing market leader.
      - 10y ago

ycombini 10y ago

And there were times when extremely smart & accomplished people were joining Facebook

jdamon96 10y ago
What are you saying about FB?
morgante 10y ago
And Facebook is now a huge and profitable company... So they all made a smart move.

grandalf 10y ago

Uber has done nearly everything right. I think its main vulnerability is that its laborers are a fickle bunch and Uber hasn't done enough to inspire any loyalty. All Uber drivers I talk to alternate between Uber and Lyft and exploit any promotions or incentives either firm offers. Uber has the opportunity to revolutionize not just logistics but also on-demand employment, but has lagged in the latter, leaving the door wide open for Lyft and other services that carve out a big niche of Uber's market. I think Uber should immediately offer the following services to its drivers: - Tax planning, withholding even if it's 1099 income or if the driver has other sources of income. - Matching IRA contributions with one year vesting. - healthcare subsidy - continuing education, or some way to level up in life by driving with Uber. - Some incentive for being a loyal, exceptional driver. - Car financing/leasing/sharing and insurance packages tailored at would-be Uber drivers who don't own a vehicle. I know that more and more of these sorts of ideas are being tried by both Uber and Lyft, but investors need to realize that the workforce is being trained to be opportunistic and disloyal. Many of the drivers I've interviewed (during my ride) despise Uber the corporation or boast about their fair weather support. Many reflect back on how Uber used to be better for drivers, etc. Uber's main battles have been fought with regulators and with Lyft, but now the best strategy is figuring out how to become the Uber of on-demand employment.

cm2012 10y ago
They are really worried about their contractors being classified as employees. That would be an existential threat.
- grandalf 10y ago
  I know that is Uber's view, I think it's mistaken and unsustainable. The lack of a sustainable policy is what creates the existential risk.
  - r00fus 10y ago
    Sustainability and big-bang VC startups seem to be mutually exclusive.

kelukelugames 10y ago

You should sign up for Blind and read the Uber employees' comments.

freyir 10y ago
Can you give the gist? You piqued my interest, but the app looks like the rabbit hole I'd rather not go down.
- phamilton 10y ago
  There seem to be two modes. First, it seems everyone hates it there and management is terrible and people get fired with no severance all the time. The other mode is aggressive recruiting. Here's an actual interaction I had: Me: I'm torn between doing something new and staying where I'm at. Random Uber employee: Hey, you should join Uber. Hit me up and I'll refer you. Me: I can assure you I'm not interested. Random Uber employee: Wuss...
  - employee8000 10y ago
    Uber employee here, and I can tell you that almost everyone I know loves working here. I apologize for the behavior of the random douchebag employee you encountered, I would hope most of us wouldn't act like that.
    - hengheng 10y ago
      So you would be happy to refer GP? :-P
  - discreetmath 10y ago
    Is it really that easy to get a referral? I'm applying for internships and I applied to Uber (online) a while ago and have heard nothing. Meanwhile, all but one of the places I have been interviewed (Google, Amazon, etc.) were places where I friend referred me. The interview rate has been 70% for places I've been referred vs. 3% for places I haven't, so getting one has been key. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to join Blind since I don't have a work email that they're available to.

maverick_iceman 10y ago

I think self-driving cars would be a major challenge for Uber. As long as ridesharing companies need human drivers network effects ensure that Uber will remain at the top. But when driverless cars become feasible Uber's moat disappears. What's stopping an upstart company to buy/lease 10,000 self-driving cars and let them loose on the street? There's no reason for customers to prefer Uber over them. (This problem becomes more acute if Uber IPO's by then and have to worry about quarterly results but their competitor can burn through VC money.)

Kiro 10y ago
That's why Uber invests so heavily in self-driving cars.
enjo 10y ago
What investor would invest in a competitor if the market is as commoditized as you foresee? (I agree with you fwiw)
- oculusthrift 10y ago
  no need for an investor. only need a GM or Tesla or Apple etc to decide to.
neosat 10y ago
"What's stopping an upstart company to buy/lease 10,000 self-driving cars and let them loose on the street?" You're right that self-driving cars would be a major challenge/opportunity. Re: what's stopping an upstart, letting self-driving cars loose on the street is inefficient. There is a huge amount learned/accrued intelligence involved in how those self driving cars are orchestrated for optimize the marketplace. So that's where a key capability is going to be important even in a world where self-driving is commoditized.
mlmlmasd 10y ago
> As long as ridesharing companies need human drivers network effects ensure that Uber will remain at the top. I think it is the opposite... Uber's only real way to turn a profit while staying competitive is to get rid of the cost of drivers. > What's stopping an upstart company to buy/lease 10,000 self-driving cars and let them loose on the street? The fact that Uber is already working on this, has a platform, has tons of data?

withdavidli 10y ago

Because a person is smart/ accomplished in their domain does not mean they will be in another. In this instance, people that are technology geniuses, doesn't mean they know about liquidation preferences and accounting.

sib 10y ago
Alternately, people who are technology geniuses and also were employee #176 at Google may not need to care about liquidation preferences and may just want to work on new and different interesting problems.

coss 10y ago

Follow the money.

cryptozeus 10y ago

I have same feeling, one my friend worked at a flywheel (uber but with taxi cabs)...he said that uber dominates this industry. They have figured out the biggest obstacle which is government regulations. This is the big challenge for any startup trying to copy uber.

klausa 10y ago
I wouldn't call "knowingly breaking the law and throwing VC money at the lawyers until the problem goes away" necessarily "figuring out government regulations".
- kinkrtyavimoodh 10y ago
  It's the same thing for practical purposes if it achieves the same aim.
  - SomeStupidPoint 10y ago
    Except that your execs are one pissed off DA away from defending RICO charges. Companies undervalue low-probability, high-risk events like that.
    - aub3bhat 10y ago
      its not rico... https://www.popehat.com/2016/06/14/lawsplainer-its-not-rico-dammit/ https://www.popehat.com/2016/06/14/lawsplainer-its-not-rico-...
      - SomeStupidPoint 10y ago
        My point was exactly that Uber can be construed as a criminal organization and their executives as the leaders of a large, international criminal organization who knowingly pay people to commit crimes on their behalf (that the bosses then profit from) and that their organization's primary business is the commission of such crimes. Is it still not RICO? Edit: Im pretty sure they could get money laundering related charges to stick well enough to charge (and settle or bring to trial, rather than dismissed), based on banking with money they know was earned in violation of various state and city laws. Money laundering law is bad (and so is RICO), and often can be applied in counter-intuitive ways by aggressive DAs.

pyrophane 10y ago

I don't know all that much about Mr. Singhal, so I have no idea if this may be true in his case, but I suspect that great engineers are frequently not the best judges of a company's prospects, especially when there are numerous factors other than the strength of their technology that will determine how they perform. With respect to Uber, regardless of anything else, they have lots of cash with which to compensate key hires, and plenty of interesting problems to work on. That might be enough.

throwaway729 10y ago
Or, more likely, they're interested in solving interesting problems and aren't afraid of losing their jobs because they've got money. That's pretty much exactly what the aft for says...

wicha 10y ago

On the flip side the Head of Economic Research of Uber left last September. You can make a weak case an insider economist could be better at predicting market success than an outsider engineer.

dangoldin 10y ago

Same here. My bear case for Uber is just that self driving will commoditize the market and turn a two sided market into a one sided market. At that point it will be the cheapest offering that wins. Wrote about it in more detail here: http://dangoldin.com/2016/05/28/uber-and-self-driving-cars/ http://dangoldin.com/2016/05/28/uber-and-self-driving-cars/

coops 10y ago

Someone like Amit doesn't need money; by the time you get as highly placed at Google as he was you will be wealthy. I believe that Uber has interesting engineering challenges but likewise have doubts about their profitability.

Eridrus 10y ago

I think there are real economies of scale in ride service. Once you have enough customers your cars are better utilised and your costs are lower, this means that while Uber's cap table may be all fucked up by the time it happens, it will lose less money competing on price than new entrants. Depending on how large these economies of scale are, even the fact that a new entrants would be doing less volume (and therefore losing more) may not be enough to help them compete.

ctrl_freak 10y ago
This analysis strongly suggests that there isn't economies of scale in ride service: http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2016/11/can-uber-ever-deliver-part-one-understanding-ubers-bleak-operating-economics.html http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2016/11/can-uber-ever-deliver...
- Eridrus 10y ago
  I agree that there are no economies of scale that cause one operator to have an advantage expanding to other cities. However, in a given city, I would expect there to be economies of scale as you optimize your cars better and decrease the amount of time they have no passengers. It's most clear to me in the case of UberPOOL where the more passengers you have in total, the more likely two of them will be going in the same direction. We may not have reached a cheap enough price point yet to hit these economies. Depending on how much you trust anything Uber says, they say they are profitable in SF, and some other US metros, which the article you linked ignores. I think people are right to be a little skeptical, given how loose Uber is with the truth, but I see a possibility for them to succeed and smart people keep giving them good money so I want to give them the benefit of the doubt on the issue of actually making money eventually.

kposehn 10y ago

Uber team member here. I was skeptical for a very long time as well, but I've been won over. The challenges are fantastic, the work intense (yet I still have time for family) and I'm part of the best team I've ever been on. The last year or so has been the best of my professional life. I would highly recommend a closer look.

newsat13 10y ago
Very inspiring. Applying for a job now.
- PutinIsEvil 10y ago
  You should try BumbaSoft. Nobody has heard of it yet but it's because we're a stealth focus security firm. Free food, free gym, swimming pool! Money is great. I can work from home (at will) and enjoy time with my family too. And work is the best I've ever done in my entire life!!! I'm waiting for your job application. Thanks.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
zigzigzag 10y ago
No offence, but saying it's a great place to work doesn't really address any of the concerns people have about Uber as a sustainable business.
amelius 10y ago
Could you please comment on how you think the business model of Uber could sustain growth, even though transportation is essentially a commodity service? Lots of people here seem confused by this question, so it would be nice to hear an explanation from somebody inside.
kposehn 10y ago
A few asked why I didn't address the sustainable business question directly. I prefer to decline due to disclosure reasons as I'm a stickler for following those.

jeevand 10y ago

If you are an engineer, go interview with them. https://eng.uber.com/ https://eng.uber.com/

thkim 10y ago

I think Uber has bright future, but I really doubt about current valuation. What's looking bright for them is that they can replace their drivers with self-driving cars eventually. By then core business competency completely transforms into capital and technology which Uber has built quite a strength. Looking at what they are right now, Uber and Lyft are both pseudo technology company that haven't added that much innovation to current landscape (different markets have different experience, i.e. SF vs NYC). But can we expect huge profitability in the future? I doubt it - they have to maintain a fleet of cars which are quite expensive to maintain, and they cannot drive out competition completely (DOJ will never allow this). Bottom line? Very competitive pricing in the future, some profitability, however I doubt margin will be good.

bsn54 10y ago

The way I see it,money(capital contribution) looted by saudis by selling oil is being distributed back to the drivers and passengers of the different countries.