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Not really a surprise. Lyft is their only real competition in the States, I don't have any idea about the global state of things but I imagine they are likewise
by nawgszy 9y ago
Not really a surprise. Lyft is their only real competition in the States, I don't have any idea about the global state of things but I imagine they are likewise entrenched with their first mover's advantage.
The real question, I thought, is: are losses per sale decreasing? If not, and if we need to see a significant price increase per ride before things can get better, I sort of wonder if the only thing the taxi industry needed to do to prevent this all from happening was develop a ride-hailing app which tracked your car and gave you the price ahead of time.
- asah 9y ago...and actually showed up when you called them ...and refund your money when the driver is a schmuck, no questions asked ...and provided cleaner, more modern cars than typical taxis ...and dealt with gnarly details in GPS ...and provided smarter, better conversationalists than typical taxi drivers ...and worked in multiple cities with one app ...and support multiple payment ...and let businesses handle complex expensing ...and and and
- jeremyjh 9y agoAnd sold dollars for $.75.
- dingo_bat 9y agoI wonder if suddenly uber raised its prices around the world to a level it would break even, would enough people still use it?
- moduspol 9y agoIf it can't break even on a 25% cut of every ride, someone else will be able to. It's a glorified SaaS app, and they have similarly priced competition in many markets. This idea that the price is unsustainable is just wishful thinking by opponents.
- ggg9990 9y agoSure. Even if the volume dropped 50% Uber could just fire half their staff. There is no way that Uber couldn’t find some volume level to play at.
- tmh79 9y agoif uber fired their lawyers and compliance staff, I bet they'd be profitable lol
- collyw 9y agoThey probably wouldn't exist.
- rankam 9y agoTaxi apps like these are prevalent in Europe and have been around for 5-7 years. MyTaxi/Hailo is owned by Daimler and is Europe's largest taxi app. Gett Taxi is a large player - Volkswagen invested $300 million in them in 2016. However, the taxi industry is regulated and can't set artificially low prices like Uber does.
- xiphias 9y agoI use Uber in Brazil, and all I see is that the Taxis are waiting in line because they are expensive and nobody wants them (although they have their special places). I talked to an Uber driver about his salary and he told me that the job is much easier than what he had before, and he's earning 3 times as much money.
- dingo_bat 9y agoNice regulations! They set a minimum price instead of maximum. Pretty clear the regulation was supposed to protect the industry not the consumers. Such regulations are the reason uber exists.
- joking 9y agoNeither can set artificially higher surge prices
- daurnimator 9y agoMany places don't even have an alternative. Here in Melbourne, Australia the only alternative that seems to exist is "GoCatch": which just books a normal taxi for you. The drivers don't have a clue about it, and often end up asking for payment (when it's all handled in the app). When visiting Vietnam, I've found no alternative to Uber that works.
- teknover 9y ago*Disclaimer: I managed GoCatch operations from Nov 2013 to Mar 2014. GoCatch has ride-sharing options since February 2016 (that's two years). While I can't state accurately to today's figures, there was akin to 350,000+ unique passengers last time I poked around. In ASEAN/AP region, Grab is huge. It's founder is from the region (Malaysia) and arguably bigger than Uber in most countries including Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and yes, Vietnam: https://www.grab.com/vn/en/ https://www.grab.com/vn/en/
- daurnimator 9y ago> GoCatch has ride-sharing options since February 2016 (that's two years). I just opened the app now; I can't see the option? (what am I looking for?) > In ASEAN/AP region, Grab is huge Ah. I forgot about Grab. I think I saw some media about them, but can't say I know anyone that has tried them.
- teknover 9y agoNo worries. There's five rows to interact with in the app. Pickup time, Pickup location, Destination, Car type and Request. Car type is what you're after. Selecting 'Economy' car type puts you in a ride share, Taxi and Maxi are taxi-related rides, Premium is hire cars or Uber. Ride types and the monikers given have been a natural evolution in the industry. Even for most folks, when they say 'Uber' they're likely referring to 'UberX' not a hire car premium experience. Grab's massive! Unless you're deep in the country, you might not have known but it's actually pretty big. Quote from CNBC from June 2017: "Grab facilitates as many as 2.5 million rides each day, making it the largest ride-hailing platform in Southeast Asia with over 930,000 drivers in 55 cities and seven countries. In the past six months alone, daily rides have more than doubled." Steve Yegge famously just joined them after leaving Google/Amazon, a great blog read if you're curious about their culture, mission.
- sebleon 9y ago> only thing the taxi industry needed to do to prevent this all from happening was develop a ride-hailing app There's no way the taxi industry could have pulled this off. There's an incredibly complex dispatch system that keeps wait times and prices low, and hundreds of millions invested in incentives to create a new consumer behavior. The long term future hinges on the self-driving, hard to imagine the taxi industry being on the forefront of this tech.
- AlexandrB 9y agoCorrection: There's no way the taxi industry could have pulled this off. They're bound by their country's labor laws.
- thriftwy 9y agoI don't know, I use a ride hailing app from a "traditional" taxi park and it's quite good. Much more options than with Uber. Doesn't seem to be that hard.
- lrem 9y agoData point: I don't know a single person using Uber in Dublin. You can hail a taxi with an app (mytaxi, used to be hailo), which actually tends to be cheaper than Uber.
- dingo_bat 9y agoData point: I know several people who have foregone buying their own cars just because they feel uber is enough. One of those people is me.
- AlphaSite 9y agoPrices have been dropping, so I assume so?
- acchow 9y agoPrices way up here in San Francisco. Often UberPool in the $3-4 range are now about $5-6.
- tmh79 9y agogotta use that pool express now, I've been getting express pools to work for 2.50 pretty consistently
- praneshp 9y agoIt's pretty good. (Lyft also has the express concept, which I've used a few times. Most of those times the driver was under the impression it was a Lyft Line, and were wondering why there weren't any more rides showing up).
- acchow 9y agoThis is a really frustrating part of the experience. Why is the driver offering to deviate from the optimized, streamlined route to go into a small one-way street just so the passenger can get dropped of 15 feet closer to their destination? And now we gotta make 3 right turns to get back to our route?