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The few numbers that Uber posted look like good news for them, but let's not overstate things. The reason that people post numbers YoY instead of QoQ most of t

The few numbers that Uber posted look like good news for them, but let's not overstate things. The reason that people post numbers YoY instead of QoQ most of the time is not to artificially inflate numbers. It's because lots of companies have yearly seasonality. If you looked at Apple's numbers for Q4 (real Q4, Oct-Dec, not Apple's fiscal Q4) quarter over quarter, they'd always look like they were on a massive, incredible growth trend. If you looked at their Q1 numbers quarter over quarter, they'd always look like they're shrinking. Since Uber is sharing a very limited subset of numbers on a purely voluntary basis, it's pretty reasonable to assume that they're showing the ones that make them look good. If they wanted to show YoY numbers, they certainly could. It stands to reason that YoY numbers aren't going to make them look massively better than QoQ numbers. And, finally, saying that you could "just" raise revenue by 6% and have it all go to the bottom line with no other effects is fantasy -- and even if they could do that, that would make them non-GAAP break-even, not "the kind of profitable company that justifies a $70B valuation."

mattmanser 9y ago
Looking at this interesting pdf: http://www.nyc.gov/html/tlc/downloads/pdf/2014_taxicab_fact_book.pdf http://www.nyc.gov/html/tlc/downloads/pdf/2014_taxicab_fact_... It looks like Taxis are seasonal and so they'll see a drop in revenue over summer (page 4). Though elsewhere they note that airport fares are up over summer. It also looks like there's a large, several day, drop over the Xmas period every year, which could potentially make Q1 better than Q4. Although I know in the UK at least Xmas rates are higher. Still, without seeing the actual figures and just eyeballing it, it's hard to say. As you say though, they could have decreased costs just by dropping what they pay their drivers. Ahem, I mean the rate they offer jobs to self-employed definitely-not-employed independent contractors. (I wasn't able to read the source article, so don't know if they've addressed that).
- aetherson 9y ago
  When I worked for Flywheel (which was an Uber competitor that uses taxis, and whose customers were concentrated heavily in San Francisco), there were a number of different, crazy seasonal effects. Rainy weather definitely spiked demand in a big way (I sometimes wonder if Flywheel would have managed to make it over a few more hurdles if California had not been in an intense multi-year drought when I worked there). There was virtually no demand from Christmas to New Years, and then New Years Eve saw demand that was 10x what it was on other days. There are other extremely high-demand holidays such as Halloween and St Patrick's Day. Basically any drinking holiday, for obvious reasons, except 4th of July. Uber is in many more markets, of course, though I suspect that a smaller number than you'd think are by far the heavyweights in their revenue and an even smaller number are the heavyweights in terms of improving their bottom line. They have surge pricing, which we didn't, and which is presumably better at turning demand into revenue than we were. Other markets may have different relationships with their weather than San Francisco did.
- malandrew 9y ago
  I would expect large multinational companies that earn revenue in all timezones and in both the northern and southern hemisphere to exhibit limited seasonality. Figures may be skewed in favor of their larger and more mature markets, but not all countries celebrate the same holidays (like Christmas) and summer and winter and flipped in the northern and southern hemispheres. I would expect local competitors to exhibit far greater seasonality than any major multinational.

mattmanser 9y ago

Looking at this interesting pdf: http://www.nyc.gov/html/tlc/downloads/pdf/2014_taxicab_fact_book.pdf http://www.nyc.gov/html/tlc/downloads/pdf/2014_taxicab_fact_... It looks like Taxis are seasonal and so they'll see a drop in revenue over summer (page 4). Though elsewhere they note that airport fares are up over summer. It also looks like there's a large, several day, drop over the Xmas period every year, which could potentially make Q1 better than Q4. Although I know in the UK at least Xmas rates are higher. Still, without seeing the actual figures and just eyeballing it, it's hard to say. As you say though, they could have decreased costs just by dropping what they pay their drivers. Ahem, I mean the rate they offer jobs to self-employed definitely-not-employed independent contractors. (I wasn't able to read the source article, so don't know if they've addressed that).

aetherson 9y ago
When I worked for Flywheel (which was an Uber competitor that uses taxis, and whose customers were concentrated heavily in San Francisco), there were a number of different, crazy seasonal effects. Rainy weather definitely spiked demand in a big way (I sometimes wonder if Flywheel would have managed to make it over a few more hurdles if California had not been in an intense multi-year drought when I worked there). There was virtually no demand from Christmas to New Years, and then New Years Eve saw demand that was 10x what it was on other days. There are other extremely high-demand holidays such as Halloween and St Patrick's Day. Basically any drinking holiday, for obvious reasons, except 4th of July. Uber is in many more markets, of course, though I suspect that a smaller number than you'd think are by far the heavyweights in their revenue and an even smaller number are the heavyweights in terms of improving their bottom line. They have surge pricing, which we didn't, and which is presumably better at turning demand into revenue than we were. Other markets may have different relationships with their weather than San Francisco did.
malandrew 9y ago
I would expect large multinational companies that earn revenue in all timezones and in both the northern and southern hemisphere to exhibit limited seasonality. Figures may be skewed in favor of their larger and more mature markets, but not all countries celebrate the same holidays (like Christmas) and summer and winter and flipped in the northern and southern hemispheres. I would expect local competitors to exhibit far greater seasonality than any major multinational.