<story><title>Uber is officially a cab firm, says European court</title><url>http://www.bbc.com/news/business-42423627</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>dguest</author><text>&amp;gt; I don&amp;#x27;t think it&amp;#x27;s too big to fail.&lt;p&gt;My gut reaction: There&amp;#x27;s no company the size of Uber that could die more quietly. The world&amp;#x27;s reaction would be a muffled &amp;quot;meh&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;Uber doesn&amp;#x27;t even own their most important asset, which is their drivers, and if they collapse catastrophically their drivers will simply turn off the Uber app and download one of a half dozen competitors&amp;#x27; apps (if they don&amp;#x27;t already have it). For Uber customers, the transition will be even easier.&lt;p&gt;Maybe I&amp;#x27;m missing something: This isn&amp;#x27;t like a car company that owns and manages factories, or like a tech company that has labs or does significant R&amp;amp;D, or even a bank that has lots of employees and owns other assets.&lt;p&gt;So genuine question: what do we loose if Uber vanishes tomorrow?&lt;p&gt;(Don&amp;#x27;t get me wrong, I&amp;#x27;d be sympathetic to their employees who need to find new jobs, but my guess is that their skills are in relatively high demand.)</text></item><item><author>djsumdog</author><text>This is good to hear. A few weeks ago we saw the recording breaking loss, showing Uber is really undercutting everyone and operating way under costs (while slashing drivers pays and yada yada).&lt;p&gt;Uber is big, really big. But I don&amp;#x27;t think it&amp;#x27;s too big to fail. And I think a failure will be colossal.&lt;p&gt;Has anyone noticed Lyft prices have gone way up? Like, almost standard cab fair prices in some cities? I wonder if Lyft is banking on the fact a lot of people use them so they don&amp;#x27;t use Uber, and noticing their prices are just slightly less than a regular cab. They could put them in a place where they&amp;#x27;re profitable, and charge a more traditional rate.&lt;p&gt;In the early days I knew Uber drivers who use to be cab drivers who claimed they made a ton more money than with their cab company. I doubt that&amp;#x27;s as true anymore, but once Uber fails, I bet we&amp;#x27;ll see a huge re-emergence of Cabs -- possibly alternative ride sharing apps that will put more money in the hands of drivers (where it should be).&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s really weird being in American cities today, because the number of cabs is significantly lower and noticeable. I saw a woman with her hand up, actually hailing a cab, and thought that was so weird. You rarely see that now. I mean it&amp;#x27;s probably better that cabs are more efficient with apps, going directly from pickup to pickup instead of burning fuel driving around, but there is still something lost with not being able to raise you hand or go to a taxi stand and get a cab in a city.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>CamTin</author><text>I think you&amp;#x27;re 100% right, and there was even natural experiment confirming this when Uber (and Lyft) left Austin temporarily. Basically the city council wanted rideshare drivers to do City background checks. There was a public referendum, and Uber&amp;#x2F;Lyft said they&amp;#x27;d leave if it passed. Then it passed, and they left. Pretty much overnight there were 3-4 Austin-centric Uber competitors. Riders and drivers just switched apps. Colloquially, people would even still say &amp;quot;get an Uber&amp;quot; while using these other apps.&lt;p&gt;Eventually this was superceded by a Texas law, and Uber&amp;#x2F;Lyft came back, but the rideshare apocalypse that was predicted never came to be because there are very few barriers to entry in this market: build a relatively simple app, paste up some fliers or billboards advertising your new company to drivers and riders, and you&amp;#x27;re in business.&lt;p&gt;Admittedly, Austin has more ambitious app coders than most other random cities, so it might not be literally overnight like it was here, but it won&amp;#x27;t take that long for somebody to do the same in the rest of the country&amp;#x2F;world. On the other hand, those places likely won&amp;#x27;t lose Lyft at the same time like Austin did, so it may be a wash.</text></comment>
<story><title>Uber is officially a cab firm, says European court</title><url>http://www.bbc.com/news/business-42423627</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>dguest</author><text>&amp;gt; I don&amp;#x27;t think it&amp;#x27;s too big to fail.&lt;p&gt;My gut reaction: There&amp;#x27;s no company the size of Uber that could die more quietly. The world&amp;#x27;s reaction would be a muffled &amp;quot;meh&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;Uber doesn&amp;#x27;t even own their most important asset, which is their drivers, and if they collapse catastrophically their drivers will simply turn off the Uber app and download one of a half dozen competitors&amp;#x27; apps (if they don&amp;#x27;t already have it). For Uber customers, the transition will be even easier.&lt;p&gt;Maybe I&amp;#x27;m missing something: This isn&amp;#x27;t like a car company that owns and manages factories, or like a tech company that has labs or does significant R&amp;amp;D, or even a bank that has lots of employees and owns other assets.&lt;p&gt;So genuine question: what do we loose if Uber vanishes tomorrow?&lt;p&gt;(Don&amp;#x27;t get me wrong, I&amp;#x27;d be sympathetic to their employees who need to find new jobs, but my guess is that their skills are in relatively high demand.)</text></item><item><author>djsumdog</author><text>This is good to hear. A few weeks ago we saw the recording breaking loss, showing Uber is really undercutting everyone and operating way under costs (while slashing drivers pays and yada yada).&lt;p&gt;Uber is big, really big. But I don&amp;#x27;t think it&amp;#x27;s too big to fail. And I think a failure will be colossal.&lt;p&gt;Has anyone noticed Lyft prices have gone way up? Like, almost standard cab fair prices in some cities? I wonder if Lyft is banking on the fact a lot of people use them so they don&amp;#x27;t use Uber, and noticing their prices are just slightly less than a regular cab. They could put them in a place where they&amp;#x27;re profitable, and charge a more traditional rate.&lt;p&gt;In the early days I knew Uber drivers who use to be cab drivers who claimed they made a ton more money than with their cab company. I doubt that&amp;#x27;s as true anymore, but once Uber fails, I bet we&amp;#x27;ll see a huge re-emergence of Cabs -- possibly alternative ride sharing apps that will put more money in the hands of drivers (where it should be).&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s really weird being in American cities today, because the number of cabs is significantly lower and noticeable. I saw a woman with her hand up, actually hailing a cab, and thought that was so weird. You rarely see that now. I mean it&amp;#x27;s probably better that cabs are more efficient with apps, going directly from pickup to pickup instead of burning fuel driving around, but there is still something lost with not being able to raise you hand or go to a taxi stand and get a cab in a city.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>btbuildem</author><text>Yes exactly. The only ones who stand to lose if uber fails are the investors who put money into it. Oh boo.</text></comment>