Uber's Still Not Profitable

Re:Uber's Still Not Profitable by epolanski on Sunday August 07, 2022 @05:04AM (#32375028)

As someone who has used Uber quite a bit across Europe I cannot understand how they are not profitable. They take what 10/20% of the ride and they do millions of rides every day. I myself have spent few thousands in their service alone.

How can they not be profitable after all these years.

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Re:Uber's Still Not Profitable by Vespasian on Sunday August 07, 2022 @05:17AM (#32375085)

If the costs per ride are higher than the fare, it doesn't matter how many they do.

In the end they have to pay for all the maintenance and initial purchase of the vehicle as well even if they manage to put those on the driver's as well.

Their "independent contractor" employment model doesn't work in some markets where they end up paying regular benefits and taxes.

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Re:Uber's Still Not Profitable by higeorge13 on Sunday August 07, 2022 @06:10AM (#32375292)

Is there a break down on their cost per ride? Infra/engineering/marketing/local regulation/etc. ?

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Re:Uber's Still Not Profitable by origin_path on Sunday August 07, 2022 @08:47AM (#32376077)

There's the ride subsidies of course, which have never gone away really.

But also, Uber is a valley tech firm, meaning it has extremely high overheads. To service all those markets Uber employed 29,300 people last year, a roughly 30% increase from 2020, and note that isn't including the drivers. That's nearly 30,000 people in operations and software development of various kinds.

Uber probably can't make money even if it stops subsidizing rides because the extra added value of a ride-hailing app (which is certainly non zero) is nonetheless not enough to offset the cost of having such a massive company, especially given that so many are earning some of the world's highest salaries.

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