Like...I get what you are saying and I agree that something like Uber was inevitable. But someone still has to go out and do it.
Your argument means no business success deserves any credit, they all just inevitable .
Ford comes to mind, or Google. They had very strong competitive advantages due to a technically superior process or product. Cars and search engines were probably inevitable, but Ford and Google moved the technology forward a whole generation.
Uber made a pretty rudimentary mobile application, their real competitive advantage had more to do with success in financial sophistication and compliance/regulatory avoidance.
I do not know the context of Ford.
But it was also innovative in business terms. Search at the time was monetized like media properties: running a lot of ads that were at best tangential to what users were doing. They instead recognized that a lot of search wasn't great for monetization, but some of it -- where users were looking for something that could be purchased -- was very valuable. So instead of banner ads and all that nonsense, the ended up with AdWords. And instead of selling it via media sales execs, they made a self-serve bidding platform.
If Google had just had a slightly better algorithm, any of the better funded players could have taken them down. But Microsoft has been trying for years to break in and Google still has 90% of the market.
What changed taxi transportation was ubiquitous personal computers with detailed screens, network connectivity, and GPS in literally everyone’s pocket.
As soon as it was technically possible to press a button on a portable device you already have and see a little car coming towards you on a map, hundreds of startup founders were going to try to do it, and did.
Before that something like Uber was impossible, after that it was inevitable. Just like something like YouTube and something like Netflix were inevitable.
That’s not to discount the very impressive work it takes to be the winner in such a fast moving market. But it’s not reasonable to credit them with the world transforming innovation, it was just the next logical step in an ongoing progression.