40,000 Drivers to lose their jobs in the next 21 days

Malthusian

Out,_Vile_Jelly wrote: »

You'd think 3.5m people had just had their water supply cut off, or been told they have to spend a day per week labouring in their landlord's fields.

Life went on before Wi-Fi as well. Should we ban that to protect the interests of Internet cafe owners and librarians?

Uber is a useful service, cheaper than black cabs and more convenient (and safer) than public transport, a happy medium which 3.5m people find of value. It has been banned for undercutting a cosy cartel which has its claws in the local government, and people don't like being screwed over, that's why 750k have signed the petition.

regprentice

westernpromise wrote: »

I'm not wholly persuaded that driving a cab should pay that kind of money. We have in front of us evidence that anyone with a driving licence and a satnav can replicate the service for about 40% of that price. It feels to me like a cab driver should earn about what a bus driver earns.

I've made a similar mental comparison between bus drivers and policemen. When the bus driver refuses to stop trouble or anti social behaviour (including drinking or taking drugs) he shouts 'i'm a bus driver not a copper' , yet according to the advert on the back of the bus he earns £4-£8k more than a police officer in his starting year. And infinitely more than my brother does as a police special.

Thrugelmir

Ronaldo_Mconaldo wrote: »

What a stupid thing to say. As their fares are entirely paid online i.e. not in cash then I would imagine that their tax and NI is more up-to-date than most black cab drivers.

Rumour has it. That fares are heavily subsidised by the private equity investors in UBER. Like Amazon. Plan A is to drive the competition off the street (literally). To gain market domination.

Chillse

Very nice, guys

Malthusian

Thrugelmir wrote: »

Rumour has it. That fares are heavily subsidised by the private equity investors in UBER. Like Amazon. Plan A is to drive the competition off the street (literally). To gain market domination.

Hardly rumour. Everyone knows that Uber absolutely haemorrhages money. It loses about $9bn a year on "net revenue" (its cut of fares) of $7bn.

One journalist described Uber as a state-owned enterprise, on the basis that Uber is funded not by customers but by venture capital, and venture capital comes primarily from government pension funds (by which they presumably mean massive US pension funds like CalPERS). It follows from this argument that governments are perfectly entitled to make Uber comply with regulations, as it's a state-owned enterprise. I'm not sure how much VC money is actually government money but it's an argument I have sympathy with.

It is no secret that Uber is trying to follow Amazon's model - never make a profit but it doesn't matter because look at the growth.

westernpromise

regprentice wrote: »

I've made a similar mental comparison between bus drivers and policemen. When the bus driver refuses to stop trouble or anti social behaviour (including drinking or taking drugs) he shouts 'i'm a bus driver not a copper' , yet according to the advert on the back of the bus he earns £4-£8k more than a police officer in his starting year. And infinitely more than my brother does as a police special.

Irrelevant comparison.

GreatApe

Malthusian wrote: »

Hardly rumour. Everyone knows that Uber absolutely haemorrhages money. It loses about $9bn a year on "net revenue" (its cut of fares) of $7bn.

One journalist described Uber as a state-owned enterprise, on the basis that Uber is funded not by customers but by venture capital, and venture capital comes primarily from government pension funds (by which they presumably mean massive US pension funds like CalPERS). It follows from this argument that governments are perfectly entitled to make Uber comply with regulations, as it's a state-owned enterprise. I'm not sure how much VC money is actually government money but it's an argument I have sympathy with.

It is no secret that Uber is trying to follow Amazon's model - never make a profit but it doesn't matter because look at the growth.

Venture capital is not from state pensions they are primarily rich individuals or companies like google/amazon buying in and also Chinese versions of google/amazon etc

Uber is loss making because it subs new cities, it does not sub existing cities where they have already won

London alone might be making uber $250 million a year in profits, although much of that is offset by looses in other markets. China was a big loss area until recently when it gave up and just bought a share of the chinese version of uber rather than hemerage more money trying to win the market there.

Also unlike amazon, who could go a lifetime trying to grab retail market share uber probably only has another 3 years of market growth before it sits back and enjoys the income

They also heavily investing in self drive tech and startups so their losses arent from operating losses but costs hiring people and staff to make self drive systems that alone will likely cost them in excess of $5 billion and 5 years.

GreatApe

Malthusian wrote: »

Hardly rumour. Everyone knows that Uber absolutely haemorrhages money. It loses about $9bn a year on "net revenue" (its cut of fares) of $7bn

No that is wrong, it has lost about $7-8 billion in total since its existence and has about $7 billion more in the bank to continue making losses if it has to do so

For all of 2016, Uber lost about $3 billion.

Uber said its gross ride bookings for the second quarter reached $8.7 billion, up from $7.5 billion in the first quarter. The number of global trips on its service increased 150 percent over the previous year, with growth strongest in developing markets.

So it looks like they will take in $40 billion just this year
Its cut is about 23.3% averaged out across the world (UK they charge more!) so its part of the cake is going to be about $8-9 billion this year

It is probably better to look at its cut so its a $8-9 billion annual business. If it stopped expanding and cut down on future plans and investments most of that $8-9 billion annually would be profit perhaps as much as two thirds.

However it will of course want to continue subbing its service and investing into the future so within 5 years it is 10 x the size or that is the theory

scd3scd4

naaaa......nothing going to happen. Anyway I will just use a mini-cab or the DLR............me no care.

Malthusian

GreatApe wrote: »

No that is wrong, it has lost about $7-8 billion in total since its existence

It's a growth-at-all-costs company, so its past losses are irrelevant. It isn't going to keep losing as much money as it did in 2015 because it's twice as big now. The relevant figure is its last quarterly loss times four.

and has about $7 billion more in the bank to continue making losses if it has to do so

Of other people's money, not its own.

So it looks like they will take in $40 billion just this year

Wouldn't be surprised given their growth rate. But how much will their losses be?

It is probably better to look at its cut so its a $8-9 billion annual business. If it stopped expanding and cut down on future plans and investments most of that $8-9 billion annually would be profit perhaps as much as two thirds.

However it will of course want to continue subbing its service and investing into the future so within 5 years it is 10 x the size or that is the theory

Absolutely, I won't dispute any of that. It's worked for Amazon and I won't be at all surprised if works for Uber. It does however depend entirely on the willingness of investors to be rewarded with jam tomorrow.