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Uber Founder Travis Kalanick Is Leaving the Company’s Board of Directors
- Traster 7y agoI really don't know enough about this: why, in general do people step down from the board of directors? Is is as simple as him not owning enough stock to justify it anymore, or are there considerations like whether he's running a competing business? It seems strange for him to leave - since as far as I can tell there's no cost to having him on the board and as the founder he brings a certain level of trust to the operation.
- dave5104 7y agoHe was ousted from his own company. Might be as simple as him just wanting to move on.
- newnewpdro 7y agoIn case you missed it his publicized history with the company isn't exactly doing their reputation any favors by being on the board. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Travis_Kalanick#Criticism_of_Kalanick's_behavior_at_Uber https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Travis_Kalanick#Criticism_of_K...
- MichaelApproved 7y agoThere is definitely a cost. For Travis, it's his time and possibly something that prevents him from creating another company. For shareholders, it's a cost of an advocate and vote. They want someone there who will represent them the best.
- kirubakaran 7y agoHe is competing with Uber Eats, in a way https://techcrunch.com/2019/02/01/the-next-big-bet-for-former-uber-ceo-travis-kalanick-may-be-cloud-kitchens-in-china/ https://techcrunch.com/2019/02/01/the-next-big-bet-for-forme...
- m11a 7y ago> and as the founder he brings a certain level of trust to the operation He wasn't exactly portrayed as a symbol of trust in the media. I guess you could say, for PR purposes, his active involvement became a liability. I don't see Uber having trust issues as a result of him leaving. I'm guessing he just wants to move on.
- jariel 7y agoAll of the above and more. Certainly, being below a certain threshold would be one important factor. He was a contentious figure, and Uber might want to see him off - remember that he got in a huge boardroom war with other board members - so this is likely something they want. His departure could have been part of the long term deal, or possibly in his contract somewhere. Though there's definitely cred in having the founder around, I suggest this is not that kind of situation. There's only so many board seats as well, there may have been angling for others to step in. Personal choice matters a lot as well - he simply may not really want to do it for a variety of reasons. To me it seems there are no hard rules for boards: it's not like hiring staff or even execs wherein you're generally looking for things, often, the board is just the 'gang of people with the power' duking it out for influence and control etc. so things can be very nuanced, political etc..
- rb808 7y agoIts a job that takes time, commitment and impacts your reputation. It isn't a trivial title on the side while you do real work.
- jacquesm 7y agoAnd, in rare cases board members can be held responsible for the actions of the board. In that sense you have a lot more to lose as a board member than as a shareholder. So if you think that the board might be held liable by shareholders for something in the future it is usually a prudent step to create as much distance between you and the board as a shareholder as you can so you don't end up on both sides of a lawsuit.
- ForHackernews 7y agoIs that true? Many people are on multiple corporate boards, and some boards meet only a few times a year. I've only been on charity boards, but it wasn't a particularly demanding commitment. I guess the reputation cost is a good point, but Kalanick is always going to be associated with Uber, whether he's officially on the board or not.
- sgent 7y agoIn a public company there's a real time commitment -- not just regular meetings, but committee meetings, etc. That said, its more like a 5-10hr / wk commitment, not a full time job.
- felipellrocha 7y agoWhat kind of commitment? Can you give concrete examples?
- jsjohnst 7y agohttps://lmgtfy.com/?q=what+does+a+member+of+a+board+of+directors+do https://lmgtfy.com/?q=what+does+a+member+of+a+board+of+direc...
- caseyf7 7y agoMy guess is he was told to leave the board by the end of 2019 when he was ousted. Selling all of his stock was a way to get back at the board.
- chrisabrams 7y agoHow does selling stock “get back” at the board?
- Waterluvian 7y agoMy best guess would be: He exits his position in a way that can hurt the investment optics of Uber.
- troydavis 7y ago> He exits his position in a way that can hurt the investment optics of Uber. He didn't do that, though. He exited his position predictably and without huge newsworthy sales. As usual, Levine puts it better than I can; from https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-12-17/the-sec-is-asking-about-esg https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-12-17/the-se...: > There is nothing particularly strange about this. At one point—basically before June 2017—Kalanick was the founder-CEO of Uber and owned an appropriate amount of stock for a founder-CEO, and now he is not the founder-CEO and is working his way down to an appropriate amount of stock for a non-founder-CEO. … > He has sold stock every day since the lockup expired. He has accounted for about 7.8% of Uber’s volume during that time
- caseyf7 7y agoGreat points, but it is highly unusual that someone in his situation would sell all of their stock so quickly. He probably couldn’t have sold it much faster.
- caseyf7 7y agoIncreasing supply of the stock combined with the knowledge that the founder, who is an insider and large shareholder, is selling stock puts downward pressure on the price which makes the board look like they mishandled the situation.
- phonon 7y agoBecause Directors have fiduciary duties of loyalty and care to the company and its stockholders--even more than the CEO does. To the extent he wants to do his own thing now, that can be an issue/liability.
- melling 7y agoA week ago HN readers thought he was diversifying his holdings: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21803639 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21803639
- sjg007 7y agohttps://techcrunch.com/2019/06/28/a-rare-glimpse-into-the-sweeping-and-potentially-troubling-cloud-kitchens-trend/ https://techcrunch.com/2019/06/28/a-rare-glimpse-into-the-sw... Based on this article Cloud Kitchens is competing with Uber Eats so my guess is that's why.
- elfexec 7y ago> I really don't know enough about this: why, in general do people step down from the board of directors? If it is voluntary, then they step down because they want to ( for whatever reason - pursue other opportunities, etc ). If it is involuntary ( forced out ), then it's pressure from shareholders ( especially a major shareholder or a group of major shareholders ). Board of directors are elected by shareholders and they serve the interests of the shareholders. Only shareholders can remove board of directors. Of course if you have more than 50% of the voting shares and are on the board of directors, then you are golden. In that case, only legal action could get you removed, but that bar is very very high.
- nickthemagicman 7y agoIt's just my person musings but..for non-commodities companies(and I don't think many tech companies are considered commodities)... I think that founders have a certain vision and talent which cannot be separated from the company. When that founder leaves, unless the company has become a monopoly, the company is basically lost. No amount of the worlds best and brightest bean counters can replace the talent and spark that founder had. These are just personal thoughts. It will be interesting to see how this plays out in the future. To see if the board killed the golden goose like Apple did in the 90s.
- sjg007 7y agoAnyone work at Cloud Kitchens? How are things there? They've already raised $700M so it must be a big opportunity.
- ben_jones 7y agoBy physically locating themselves in the upper atmosphere cloud kitchens are saving tons of money on refrigeration costs. Combined with advancements to automated drone deliveries which are JUST around the corner the enterprise could be profitable as soon as Q3 2021.
- redsymbol 7y agoOh come on, downvoters! This is hilarious. Don't be such a Grinch.
- shadowprofile77 7y agoaaand it got flagged. the pedantic hypochondriac crowd tendency at hacker news really is full of humorless shit sometimes.
- debaserab2 7y agoFine by me. This isn’t reddit. Signal to noise ratio actually matters here.
- enraged_camel 7y agoDoes it? Because lots of shitty cliche jokes regularly get upvoted and built upon even further, whereas others that are actually good get flag-killed within a short timespan. I’ve been looking for an explanation for this wild discrepancy but I’ve come to believe it’s just luck, and depends on people’s collective moods that day. Would make for an interesting deep-dive to be sure.
- threatofrain 7y ago
- fossuser 7y agoI have a pet theory that Travis is leveraging his new company to end up attempting a Jobs NeXt Step style reverse take over of Uber. I could be reading tea leaves, but it seems like something he’d have thought about.
- blunderkid 7y agoOr he is quite happy to have cashed out instead of wasting his life away trying to run a low (if any) margin, weak network effects business with local competitors and regulators nibbling at your sanity.
- ArmandGrillet 7y agoThat doesn't fit what's portrayed in Super Pumped: The Battle for Uber, but only time will tell.
- utopian3 7y agoIs that book any more worthwhile to read than the dozens of articles that have been published since 2017? Debating adding it to my audiobook queue...
- stingrae 7y agoPersonally, I found it to be a rehash of all the articles since 2017. Even the structure of the book is like each chapter was an article about a set of events.
- texasbigdata 7y agoWeak network effects? That's not what I read in the prospectus! :)
- bane 7y agoIt's kind of amazing that almost 100% of the Uber and Lyft rides I've taken in the last 6 months have had drivers/cars that work for both simultaneously. There only service distinction is which app you use to book the ride, the inventory and employees are all the same.
- rolltiide 7y agoEnjoy the money Travis! You won the game :)
- lostlogin 7y agoConsidering what went on at Uber under his watch, I disagree.
- NelsonMinar 7y agoI wonder what impact him selling all his stock had on the share price. They floated 180M shares at IPO, Travis owned 117.5M. Average daily volume is about 25M shares.
- loftyai 7y agoThe release of the news might move the market a bit, but typically for these large volume trades, they don't go through the typical exchanges like NYSE. Instead, traders will often deal with another large player through an OTC transaction.
- stingraycharles 7y agoAlso, I assume this would have been announced in advance, not? Or doesn’t this apply to him as he’s not an executive anymore?
- alexnewman 7y agoMany studies have shown that in the long term, OTC and normal trades have same stock impact.
- BoiledCabbage 7y agoSo he'll no longer make money if Uber stock takes off?
- greenyoda 7y agoIf he thought Uber stock would take off, wouldn't he have kept at least some of his stock? (The article notes that he's sold all his remaining stock.)
- aurizon 7y agoRunning down the anchor chain?
- Tomminn 7y agoWhile I don't think this is the case here, it's super interesting that leaving in disgrace can be a valid financial exit strategy. The founder and (ex) CEO of a company is able to sell 100% of their stock without causing a panic, under the condition there is another story which justifies it. Suppose you were in a position where you thought poorly of the long term viability of the company. Wouldn't engineering a fallout with* the board be ultimately prudent? *"with" here could even mean "in collaboration with".
- stevievee 7y agoA methodical and peaceful exit ultimately is more prudent. For speed and financial gain, you might be on to something but I think you pay for it in negative legacy.
- meowface 7y agoRight. When you're already super-rich, positive reputation probably matters a lot more to you than negative reputation + more money.
- WomanCanCode 7y agoUber, unlike WeWork, is offering something the market really need. I see a viable path for them moving forward.