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Vehicle depreciation doesn’t matter unless you’re selling the thing. Wear and tear will be reduced with an all-electric drivetrain, which is uncommon for Ubers

Vehicle depreciation doesn’t matter unless you’re selling the thing. Wear and tear will be reduced with an all-electric drivetrain, which is uncommon for Ubers outside of California. Costs will be further reduced by bulk maintenance and solar charging. Autonomous vehicles will also have extremely high utilization rates since they can run 24 hours a day, versus a cab or Uber vehicle which sits idle, losing money.

com2kid 2y ago
> Autonomous vehicles will also have extremely high utilization rates since they can run 24 hours a day, versus a cab or Uber vehicle which sits idle, losing money. Math doesn't work out there. You need N number of vehicles to give good service (low wait times) during peak hours and special events, and a much smaller number of vehicles the rest of the time. Only a small portion of a fleet will need to run 24/7. Now that said, they can cycle vehicles in and out of 24 hour shifts to spread the wear and tear more evenly across the fleet, assuming there is a benefit to doing that.
- ra7 2y ago
  The vehicles can also be redeployed during off-peak hours for delivery services. They’ve previously also talked about private subscriptions for individuals.
roughly 2y ago
I expect some tuning around torque curves and the like, but electric drivetrains aren’t a pure positive for wear and tear - the heavier weight plus torque and general drivetrain characteristics are murder on tires, suspension, and several other wear items on the vehicle. High duty, and especially high duty from taxi-style driving, is likely to impact wear as well. You’re right about the benefits of bulk maintenance, although I’m skeptical that a taxi operator will be able to pull off pure solar charging - typical electric car batteries are on the order of 40-60kWh, which is about what an average home uses in a day or two. Scale that up to a reasonably-sized fleet of electric vehicles, and I suspect any fleet operator will be buying their juice. The utilization rate on the vehicles will be interesting - browsing around a bit looks like an average cab runs between 70-100k miles per year (the car, not the driver - most taxis run multiple shifts), so call it ~200-300mi per day, so they ought to be able to make it the whole day on a single charge. Once you own the vehicle, though, it’s pay per use - as you note, if you’re not planning to sell it, it’s not really losing money sitting around. It’s not making money, but it’s also not incurring costs from operation.
JumpCrisscross 2y ago
> Vehicle depreciation doesn’t matter unless you’re selling the thing Depreciation is replacement cost smoothed out. If a business is unprofitable after depreciation it cannot organically replace its capital equipment. That said, I’m sceptical of the Uber and Lyft being unprofitable for drivers after depreciation. Doubly so in the cities Waymo targets.
RivieraKid 2y ago
Utilization will be higher but possibly not by much because demand is not constant but peaks when people move to or from work. I wonder how does the higher utilization affect costs. For example, if you have a car that can last 400k miles, how much do you save if you finance it for 2 years vs for 6 years? One thing to consider is that there's miles-driven depreciation and time depreciation. Time depreciation means that the vehicle loses value over time even if you don't use it. A brand new Waymo Chrysler Pacifica will have much less value in 20 years than today.

com2kid 2y ago

> Autonomous vehicles will also have extremely high utilization rates since they can run 24 hours a day, versus a cab or Uber vehicle which sits idle, losing money. Math doesn't work out there. You need N number of vehicles to give good service (low wait times) during peak hours and special events, and a much smaller number of vehicles the rest of the time. Only a small portion of a fleet will need to run 24/7. Now that said, they can cycle vehicles in and out of 24 hour shifts to spread the wear and tear more evenly across the fleet, assuming there is a benefit to doing that.

ra7 2y ago
The vehicles can also be redeployed during off-peak hours for delivery services. They’ve previously also talked about private subscriptions for individuals.

roughly 2y ago

I expect some tuning around torque curves and the like, but electric drivetrains aren’t a pure positive for wear and tear - the heavier weight plus torque and general drivetrain characteristics are murder on tires, suspension, and several other wear items on the vehicle. High duty, and especially high duty from taxi-style driving, is likely to impact wear as well. You’re right about the benefits of bulk maintenance, although I’m skeptical that a taxi operator will be able to pull off pure solar charging - typical electric car batteries are on the order of 40-60kWh, which is about what an average home uses in a day or two. Scale that up to a reasonably-sized fleet of electric vehicles, and I suspect any fleet operator will be buying their juice. The utilization rate on the vehicles will be interesting - browsing around a bit looks like an average cab runs between 70-100k miles per year (the car, not the driver - most taxis run multiple shifts), so call it ~200-300mi per day, so they ought to be able to make it the whole day on a single charge. Once you own the vehicle, though, it’s pay per use - as you note, if you’re not planning to sell it, it’s not really losing money sitting around. It’s not making money, but it’s also not incurring costs from operation.

JumpCrisscross 2y ago

> Vehicle depreciation doesn’t matter unless you’re selling the thing Depreciation is replacement cost smoothed out. If a business is unprofitable after depreciation it cannot organically replace its capital equipment. That said, I’m sceptical of the Uber and Lyft being unprofitable for drivers after depreciation. Doubly so in the cities Waymo targets.

RivieraKid 2y ago

Utilization will be higher but possibly not by much because demand is not constant but peaks when people move to or from work. I wonder how does the higher utilization affect costs. For example, if you have a car that can last 400k miles, how much do you save if you finance it for 2 years vs for 6 years? One thing to consider is that there's miles-driven depreciation and time depreciation. Time depreciation means that the vehicle loses value over time even if you don't use it. A brand new Waymo Chrysler Pacifica will have much less value in 20 years than today.