The Ledger
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San Francisco Threatened Kalanick With 90 Days in Jail Per Uber Ride
“I got threatened by the city of San Francisco and the state of California three months after we launched Uber with 90 days in jail for every ride that had occurred.”
Kalanick: 13% of San Francisco vehicle miles were Uber when he departed
“When I left Uber, 13% of all San Francisco miles were Uber miles.”
Tesla currently intends to launch its robotaxi network independently without Uber
“At this point they're looking to go it alone”
Uber is partnered with Chinese autonomous operators Baidu, WeRide, and Pony
“So there are Baidu WeRide, Pony are all on the road today, no safety driver. We are partners with all of them.”
Friedberg notes Waymo captured 22% of the San Francisco rideshare market
“Waymo launched in SF in August, 20, 23 in kind of an open market way. Uber and Lyft were 66 and 34% market share at the time. And in 15 months in November of 2024, Waymo is now a 22% market share of rides in SF, which is the same as Lyft and Uber is now down t…”
Kalanick: Average Uber driver worked eight hours weekly during his tenure
“And let's be clear, the average Uber driver during my, you know, let's say at the end of my tenure was eight hours a week.”
Kalanick: Uber turned $1.5 billion into an $8–$9 billion Didi stake
“So we turned a bill and a half into eight or nine. I can't remember the exact math, but it's something like that.”
Calacanis: Kalanick was banned from stage at Uber IPO bell ringing
“He was disinvited. So he was there on the floor. It was very awkward. And then they didn't have him go up and ring the bell or be even there when Dara rang the bell. It was because it was so controversial. They didn't, they banned him.”
Friedberg: Uber went from $9B loss to $5B EBITDA run rate
“When he took over that business, I think it was an eight to nine billion dollar net loss in 2019. Five billion dollar EBITDA run rate right now.”
Calacanis: Uber bought a data labeling firm for driver transition
“They bought a data labeling company and they're taking the drivers and saying, hey, you want to do some data labeling over here and actually creating AI jobs for them.”
Calacanis: Headcounts at Meta, Uber, and Amazon have dropped from peak levels
“You know, Meta peaked at 86,000 employees now at 75. Uber at 33, now at 31. And Amazon, where you would think you'd have a lot of growth here they're at, they peaked at 1.6 and now they're down at 1.55.”
Sam Altman and Jason Calacanis sourced Stripe and Uber for Sequoia
“You helped us with the investment in Uber. Sam Altman was in that group as well. He helped with an investment in a little company called Stripe.”
Uber generated over $8.5 billion in cash flow over the last year
“The past 12 months we've had over eight and a half billion of cash flow.”
Calacanis: Google, Uber, Airbnb, Meta doubled revenue per employee in 2-3 years
“If you look at Google, Uber, Airbnb, and Facebook Meta, They have the same number or less employees than they did three years ago, but they're all growing in that 20 to 30% a year, which means in but two to three years, each of those companies has doubled reve…”
Kalanick: Uber launched ride sharing second to Lyft in almost every US city
“In almost every city in the US other than two, Portland, Vegas, We were number two in ride sharing for this reason.”
Calacanis predicts consumer comfort services like DoorDash and Uber will thrive in 2024
“I'm going to go with consumer comfort services. I think as austerity measures and this, whether we have a soft landing or a recession, it's clear the consumers have spent all their money. So they're going to go for small luxuries like DoorDash, Airbnb, Uber, s…”
Calacanis: Lyft and Uber report driver shortages are over
“Lyft and Uber are reporting that the driver shortages are over. They no longer have to pay people spiffs and stuff like that to get people to come back to work.”
Calacanis: SoftBank selling Uber stake to cover Didi losses
“SoftBank is clearing a bunch of its Uber position to cover their losses in DD.”
Palihapitiya: Uber CEO reported New York drivers earning $38 per hour
“Dara Korshashawi, the CEO of Uber said on the Uber earnings call last week that the average hourly rate that some drivers in New York, Uber drivers in New York were getting paid was 38 bucks an hour.”
Chamath: Average employee tenure is under 3.5 years at Uber, Tesla, Google
“The average tenure at Uber is 1.8 years. The average tenure at Tesla is 2.1 years. The average tenure at Google is 3.2 years.”
Kalanick: Uber private funding round cleared at $17B valuation
“It was 17, but you know, no one's counting.”
Waymo driverless rides are currently active on Uber in Austin and Atlanta
“Waymo, Waymo is working with us now in Austin and Atlanta. So in Austin and Atlanta, if you're using Uber, ah, you can be picked up, ah, with a Waymo.”
Ridesharing currently accounts for only 1% to 2% of global rides
“A little more, but it's between one and two percent.”
Travis Kalanick says Saudi Arabia invested $3.5B before the Vision Fund existed
“We did stuff with the Saudis, Before even Vision Fund existed, they stroked a three and a half billion dollar check when that was like the biggest thing that ever happened.”
Friedberg: Uber has 150M monthly users compared to Expedia's 50M annual
“Uber has got about a hundred fifty million monthly active users. Expedia has about 45, fifty million customers a year that use the service and pay for stuff.”
Calacanis: Uber's ad business made $350M in year one
“And then you may have noticed Uber's doing an ad business now. They did three hundred fifty million dollars in the first year of that business, a million a day, and they're projected to do a billion next year.”
Palihapitiya: Instacart public comps fell 50% to 70% from 2021 highs
“You know, the comps to Instacart are off anywhere between 50 and 70%. You know, takeaway is off 70%. Uber is down 60%. DoorDash was down 55%.”