I use my same Uber account in nearly any country when I land at the airport. This week I paid £117 for a trip from Heathrow to my flat, and the driver got £97.

I use my same Uber account in nearly any country when I land at the airport. This week I paid £117 for a trip from Heathrow to my flat, and the driver got £97. Uber pocketed £20 and they weren’t even inside the car. Businesses are about cash flow, and Uber has an abundance of it. They’ve also clearly won the mindshare battle with Lyft, and are “the” ride-share app in every market. Regional providers only displace them in countries with protective regulations, and even in those places people still ask “what’s the Uber app here?” They were leading the pack, kept their lead, and now they’re running steady with nobody on their tail. The founders got them through the growth stage, with plenty of controversial behavior that helped attract the “perma bears,” who may have been right if the founders remained in charge. But ever since the suits took over the company, they’ve been fine tuning it into the money printing machine it was always destined to be.