The Ledger
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Kalanick Claims Uber Never Pushed Regulations to Advantage Itself
“I never did that.
Like we never did that.
We basically never ever
Proposed or pushed any rule that would be beneficial to us versus somebody else.”
Kalanick: 2017 Would Have Been Different If Uber Partnered With a16z
“If we did it business at Uber, my 2017 would have been a different year.”
Hays: Uber would be worth over $1T if Kalanick remained CEO
“His take, which I totally agree with is it's hard to, if Travis had stayed in the role, It's hard to imagine Uber being worth less than something like a trillion dollars today.”
Rauch: Cloudbleed leaked Uber auth tokens onto Google search
“You could, I don't know if the audience knows, but you could Google and literally find auth tokens of different companies like Uber indexed by Google.”
Hays: Disintermediation prevents freelance platforms from reaching Uber-scale network effects
“The primary issue with these labor marketplaces like Fiverr is disintermediation. If you If a business hires somebody on Fiverr and has an amazing experience, eventually they're just gonna go direct because they build up a lot of trust, and it's very different…”
Travis Kalanick plots new self-driving venture with Uber and Anthony Levandowski
“The news is Travis Kalanick plots new self-driving venture with Lewandowski and Uber. Kalanick has also been discussing acquiring the startup founded by Anthony Lewandowski, who has been developing autonomous software for mining and other industrial use cases.”
Cheap Food Delivery Will Disrupt Kitchens Like Uber Disrupted Cars
“Can you get a meal, ah, that's prepared and delivered to you so efficient that it starts to approach the cost of going to the grocery store. Because if you do to the kitchen what Uber did to the car.”
Capital Is a Strategic Weapon Required to Win AI Platform Wars
“Capital becomes a strategic weapon, which means you must be the best at getting capital in order to win. And we realized that early on in the Uber days, of course, that's happening times 10 in the sort of, let's call the digital AI wars.”
Uber's Historical Operational Execution Remains Superior to Modern Tech Startups
“I still think we probably did things better than anybody that some of those things probably are still better than anybody even today. But obviously the check size much bigger.”
Shah: AI agents will destroy DoorDash and Uber moats by price-shopping
“The real lock in, the real business value, The franchise value of an Uber or a DoorDash is the customer lock-in because the customer gets comfortable. They've got everything saved. They want to hit a couple buttons. They don't price shop. Agents are happy to p…”
Hays: Benchmark is less likely to oust founders after Uber fallout
“I would argue like they are probably less likely to go against the founder given, given how this entire situation has played out.”
Uber Priced Private Mega-Rounds Using Internal Iterative Auction Mechanisms
“We would basically, once they said they were interested, we would then give them a piece of paper. It was like digital, but it was like, you need to fill out this table, which is This valuation, how much money you want to put in this valuation, how much money,…”
Bartlett: AI-native startups will create hundreds of billions in equity value
“But I still think we'll end up with hundreds of billions of dollars of equity value created for, you know, the derivative companies akin to the, Yeah. To the Ubers and the WhatsApps and whoever else.”
Hays: Calacanis deserves a spot on angel investing's Mount Rushmore
“If there was a Mount Rushmore of angel investors, he certainly would be on it with the Uber.”
Kalanick on Uber's Growth: 'We Didn't Acquire Shit, We Just Built'
“It's like not, I guess you were, it's different today, but in my world, we didn't acquire shit. We just built.”
D.C. Regulators Pushed $1.5M Insurance for Uber Versus $25K for Taxis
“Like I remember we went to DC and the taxi system, the liability on a ride, if you took a taxi, it might still be this way to this day was like 25,000 dollars in a taxi.
But we went to, we being Uber at the time, went to DC and they pushed a one and a half mil…”
Laffont: Chinese ride-sharing startups fought 150 rivals before Didi defeated Uber
“Like you would have, if you had a ride sharing company, there were a 150 other ride sharing companies that you had to kind of get through just to then win your city, to then go and compete with all the other cities, to then at the end compete against Uber in C…”
Coogan: Benchmark's Uber stake would net every partner $1 billion
“Every partner at benchmark, it's an equal partnership. So every partner was going to make a clean one billion dollars. They were all going to be billionaires from this one deal.”
Uber Ran Parallel Fundraising Rooms Segmented by $25M to $250M Checks
“The last round of funding that I did at Uber, we were like a seventy million or, you know, I don't know, it was like a 60, seventy billion dollar pre Let's see that. Yeah. When that used to be a thing. Now I go, that's small stuff, but we had four rooms. This …”
Coogan: Vibe-coding an Uber clone is useless without network effects
“You can vibe code a pickup app that, you know, looks like Uber has a map, lets you click the button, accepts payment. But if there's no one on the other side of that network to actually come and pick you up, your Uber, Uber clone is dead in the water now.”
Gurman: Upgraded Siri commerce integrations will become a massive business
“When this new Siri starts working, when it has those upgraded technologies that mean that I can call an Uber for my phone and know that it's actually going to happen, then they'll be able to come to those financial agreements because people are going to start …”
Singer: Coco is the only robot delivery company partnering with Uber, DoorDash
“We're kind of the only company that's partnered with Uber, DoorDash, and a bunch of other partners that we're kind of announcing soon.”
Coogan: Only two of Benchmark's 2017 partners remain today
“On that exact date, Benchmark's equal GP roster was Bill Gurley, Eric Vistria, Matt Kohler, Mitch Lasky, Peter Fenton, Sarah Tavel. Today, the partnership has changed dramatically. The only two that remain are Peter and Eric. And you have Chetan, Ev Randall, a…”
Jason Calacanis Turned a $10,000 Early Uber Check Into $100 Million
“There was like a angel group that I pitched to. There were like 30, 40 people in the room. I think it was like three or four that invested. Okay. The 10 grand check became like a hundred million bucks.”
Coogan: Uber outsourced its initial software build-out
“Uber's initial build out was all outsourced and it was like a mark on the company. Obviously it didn't affect them. They went on a generational run.”
Coogan: Extreme wealth shifts problem-solving from consumer apps to personal staff
“There's also the shift from most people have like an app. And when you reach a level of wealth, you have a guy. Like instead of, and instead of DoorDash, you have a personal chef. Instead of Uber, you have a personal driver. Instead of United Airlines app, you…”