San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...
, provides
mobility as a service
Mobility as a service (MaaS) is a type of service that, through a joint digital channel, enables users to plan, book, and pay for multiple types of mobility services. The concept describes a shift away from personally-owned modes of transportation ...
,
ride-hailing
A ridesharing company (also known as a transportation network company, ride-hailing service; the vehicles are called app-taxis or e-taxis) is a company that, via websites and mobile apps, matches passengers with drivers of vehicles for hire tha ...
(allowing users to book a car and driver to transport them in a way similar to a
taxi
A taxi, also known as a taxicab or simply a cab, is a type of vehicle for hire with a driver, used by a single passenger or small group of passengers, often for a non-shared ride. A taxicab conveys passengers between locations of their choic ...
),
food delivery
Retail food delivery is a courier service in which a restaurant, store, or independent food-delivery company delivers food to a customer. An order is typically made either through a restaurant or grocer's website or mobile app, or through a food ...
(
Uber Eats
Uber Eats is an online food ordering and delivery platform launched by Uber in 2014. Meals are delivered by couriers using cars, scooters, bikes, or on foot. It is operational in over 6,000 cities across 45 countries as of 2021. The process of ...
and
Postmates
Postmates is a food delivery service, founded in 2011, and acquired by Uber in 2020. It offers local delivery of restaurant-prepared meals and other goods. It is headquartered in San Francisco, California.
, Postmates operates in 2,940 U.S. ...
),
package delivery
Package delivery or parcel delivery is the delivery of shipping containers, parcels, or high value mail as single shipments. The service is provided by most postal systems, express mail, private courier companies, and less than truckload shi ...
,
courier
A courier is a person or organisation that delivers a message, package or letter from one place or person to another place or person. Typically, a courier provides their courier service on a commercial contract basis; however, some couriers are ...
s, and freight transportation. Via partnerships with other operators such as
Thames Clippers
Thames Clippers (since July 2020 branded as Uber Boat by Thames Clippers for sponsorship purposes with Uber) is a river bus service on the Thames in London, England.
The company operates both commuter services between eastern and Central Lon ...
(boats) and
Lime
Lime commonly refers to:
* Lime (fruit), a green citrus fruit
* Lime (material), inorganic materials containing calcium, usually calcium oxide or calcium hydroxide
* Lime (color), a color between yellow and green
Lime may also refer to:
Botany ...
motorized scooter
A motorized scooter is a stand-up scooter powered by either a small utility internal combustion engine or a small electric hub motor in its front and/or rear wheel. Classified as a form of micro-mobility, they are generally designed with a lar ...
s), users are also able to book other modes of transport through the Uber platform in some locations. Uber sets fares, which vary using a
dynamic pricing
Dynamic pricing, also referred to as surge pricing, demand pricing, or time-based pricing, is a pricing strategy in which businesses set flexible prices for products or services based on current market demands. Businesses are able to change pric ...
model based on local supply and demand at the time of the booking and are quoted to the customer in advance, and receives a commission from each booking. It had operations in approximately 72 countries and 10,500 cities as of December 31, 2021.
Uber offers many different types of ride options. UberX is the most popular and the standard service of the company. UberXL, Uber Comfort, and Uber Black are other options offered by the company. UberXL cars are usually
SUV
A sport utility vehicle (SUV) is a car classification that combines elements of road-going passenger cars with features from off-road vehicles, such as raised ground clearance and four-wheel drive.
There is no commonly agreed-upon definiti ...
-sized vehicles that can accommodate 6 passengers. Uber's premium service is Uber Black. Uber Black drivers have to be highly rated and drive more luxurious vehicles than UberX and UberXL. Uber Comfort guarantees a newer vehicle with more leg room.
In the second quarter of 2022, Uber had 122 million monthly active users worldwide and generated an average of 21 million trips per day. In the United States, as of May 2022, Uber had a 72% market share for ride-sharing and a 27% market share for food delivery. Uber has been so prominent in the sharing economy that
commoditization
In business literature, commoditization is defined as the process by which goods that have economic value and are distinguishable in terms of attributes (uniqueness or brand) end up becoming simple commodities in the eyes of the market or consum ...
of
service industries
Service industries are those not directly concerned with the production of physical goods (such as agriculture and manufacturing).
Some service industries, including transportation, wholesale trade and retail trade are part of the supply chain de ...
uberisation
Gig workers are independent contractors, online platform workers, contract firm workers, on-call workers, and temporary workers. Gig workers enter into formal agreements with on-demand companies to provide services to the company's clients.
In m ...
, and several startups have described their offerings as "Uber for X". Uber has posted hundreds of millions or billions of dollars in losses each year since 2014 except for 2018, when it exited from the markets in Russia, China, and Southeast Asia in exchange for stakes in rival businesses.
Like similar companies, Uber has been criticized for the treatment of its drivers as
gig worker
Gig workers are independent contractors, online platform workers, contract firm workers, on-call workers, and temporary workers. Gig workers enter into formal agreements with on-demand companies to provide services to the company's clients.
In ...
s and
independent contractor
Employment is a relationship between two parties regulating the provision of paid labour services. Usually based on a contract, one party, the employer, which might be a corporation, a not-for-profit organization, a co-operative, or any oth ...
s, disruption of
taxicab
A taxi, also known as a taxicab or simply a cab, is a type of vehicle for hire with a driver, used by a single passenger or small group of passengers, often for a non-shared ride. A taxicab conveys passengers between locations of their choi ...
businesses, and an increase in traffic congestion. The company has been criticized for various unethical practices—many revealed by a massive document leak in July 2022—and for ignoring local regulations. Uber is regulated in many jurisdictions and the company has been banned in several countries.
History
In 2009, Uber was founded as Ubercab by
Garrett Camp
Garrett Camp (born October 4, 1978) is a Canadian billionaire entrepreneur. He has helped build a series of companies, including founding StumbleUpon, a web-discovery tool; co-founding Uber; and founding Expa, a startup studio. Camp is chairm ...
, a computer programmer and the co-founder of StumbleUpon, and
Travis Kalanick
Travis Cordell Kalanick (; born August 6, 1976) is an American businessman best known as the co-founder and former chief executive officer (CEO) of Uber. Previously he worked for Scour, a peer-to-peer file sharing application company, and was t ...
, who sold his Red Swoosh startup for $19 million in 2007.
After Camp and his friends spent $800 hiring a private driver, he wanted to find a way to reduce the cost of direct transportation. He realized that sharing the cost with people could make it affordable, and his idea morphed into Uber. Kalanick joined Camp and gives him "full credit for the idea" of Uber. The prototype was built by Camp and his friends, Oscar Salazar and Conrad Whelan, with Kalanick as the "mega advisor" to the company.
In February 2010, Ryan Graves became the first Uber employee, receiving the job by responding to a post on
Twitter
Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...
. Graves started out as general manager and was named CEO shortly after the launch. In December 2010, Kalanick succeeded Graves as CEO. Graves became
chief operating officer
A chief operating officer or chief operations officer, also called a COO, is one of the highest-ranking executive positions in an organization, composing part of the " C-suite". The COO is usually the second-in-command at the firm, especially if ...
(COO). By 2019, Graves owned 31.9 million shares.
Following a beta launch in May 2010, Uber's services and mobile app launched publicly in San Francisco in 2011. Originally, the application only allowed users to hail a black luxury car and the price was 1.5 times that of a taxi. In 2011, the company changed its name from UberCab to Uber after complaints from San Francisco taxicab operators.
The company's early hires included a nuclear physicist, a computational neuroscientist, and a machinery expert who worked on predicting demand for private hire car drivers. In April 2012, Uber launched a service in Chicago, whereby users were able to request a regular taxi or an Uber driver via its mobile app.
In July 2012, the company introduced UberX, a cheaper option that allowed drivers to use non-luxury vehicles, including their personal vehicles, subject to a background check, insurance, registration, and vehicle standards. By early 2013, the service was operating in 35 cities.
In December 2013, ''
USA Today
''USA Today'' (stylized in all uppercase) is an American daily middle-market newspaper and news broadcasting company. Founded by Al Neuharth on September 15, 1982, the newspaper operates from Gannett's corporate headquarters in Tysons, Virgi ...
'' named Uber its tech company of the year.
In August 2014, Uber launched a
shared transport
Shared transport or shared mobility is a transportation system where travelers share a vehicle either simultaneously as a group (e.g. ride-sharing) or over time (e.g. carsharing or bike sharing) as personal rental, and in the process share the c ...
service in the
San Francisco Bay Area
The San Francisco Bay Area, often referred to as simply the Bay Area, is a populous region surrounding the San Francisco, San Pablo, and Suisun Bay estuaries in Northern California. The Bay Area is defined by the Association of Bay Area Go ...
. The service soon launched in other cities worldwide.
In August 2014, Uber launched
Uber Eats
Uber Eats is an online food ordering and delivery platform launched by Uber in 2014. Meals are delivered by couriers using cars, scooters, bikes, or on foot. It is operational in over 6,000 cities across 45 countries as of 2021. The process of ...
, a
food delivery
Retail food delivery is a courier service in which a restaurant, store, or independent food-delivery company delivers food to a customer. An order is typically made either through a restaurant or grocer's website or mobile app, or through a food ...
service.
In August 2016, facing tough competition, Uber sold its operations in China to
DiDi
Didi may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* "Didi" (song), a song by Khaled
* Didi, the principal character in ''Didi's Comedy Show'', a German comedy television show
* Didi Pickles, mother of Tommy and Dil in the cartoons ''Rugrats'' and ''All ...
in exchange for an 18% stake in DiDi. DiDi agreed to invest $1 billion in Uber. Uber had started operations in China in 2014, under the name 优步 (Yōubù).
In December 2016, Uber acquired the AI research startup Geometric Intelligence for an undisclosed amount. This coincided with the announcement of Uber AI Labs. Geometric Intelligence's 15 person staff formed the initial core of the AI Labs team.
In August 2017,
Dara Khosrowshahi
Dara Khosrowshahi ( fa, دارا خسروشاهی, ; born May 28, 1969) is an Iranian-American businessman and the chief executive officer of Uber. Khosrowshahi was previously CEO of Expedia Group, a company that owns several travel fare aggreg ...
, the former CEO of
Expedia Group
Expedia Group, Inc. is an American online travel shopping company for consumer and small business travel. Its websites, which are primarily travel fare aggregators and travel metasearch engines, include Expedia.com, Hotels.com, Vrbo (previous ...
, replaced Kalanick as CEO. In July 2017, Uber received a five-star privacy rating from the Electronic Frontier Foundation, but was harshly criticised by the group in September 2017 for a controversial policy of tracking customers' locations even after a ride ended, forcing the company to reverse its policy.
In February 2018, Uber combined its operations in
Russia
Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-eig ...
,
Armenia
Armenia (), , group=pron officially the Republic of Armenia,, is a landlocked country in the Armenian Highlands of Western Asia.The UNbr>classification of world regions places Armenia in Western Asia; the CIA World Factbook , , and ' ...
,
Azerbaijan
Azerbaijan (, ; az, Azərbaycan ), officially the Republic of Azerbaijan, , also sometimes officially called the Azerbaijan Republic is a transcontinental country located at the boundary of Eastern Europe and Western Asia. It is a part of t ...
,
Belarus
Belarus,, , ; alternatively and formerly known as Byelorussia (from Russian ). officially the Republic of Belarus,; rus, Республика Беларусь, Respublika Belarus. is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by ...
,
Georgia
Georgia most commonly refers to:
* Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia
* Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States
Georgia may also refer to:
Places
Historical states and entities
* Related to the ...
and
Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan, officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a transcontinental country located mainly in Central Asia and partly in Eastern Europe. It borders Russia to the north and west, China to the east, Kyrgyzstan to the southeast, Uzbeki ...
with those of
Yandex.Taxi
Yandex.Taxi (Russian: Яндекс.Такси) is an international company owned by Russian IT-giant Yandex and that operates taxi aggregation and food tech businesses across Russia, CIS, Eastern Europe, Africa and the Middle East. The compan ...
and invested $225 million in the venture. In March 2018, Uber merged its services in
Southeast Asia
Southeast Asia, also spelled South East Asia and South-East Asia, and also known as Southeastern Asia, South-eastern Asia or SEA, is the geographical south-eastern region of Asia, consisting of the regions that are situated south of mainlan ...
with those of Grab in exchange for a 27.5% ownership stake in Grab.
In November 2018, Uber became a gold member of the Linux Foundation.
On May 10, 2019, Uber became a
public company
A public company is a company whose ownership is organized via shares of stock which are intended to be freely traded on a stock exchange or in over-the-counter markets. A public (publicly traded) company can be listed on a stock exchange ( ...
via an
initial public offering
An initial public offering (IPO) or stock launch is a public offering in which shares of a company are sold to institutional investors and usually also to retail (individual) investors. An IPO is typically underwritten by one or more investme ...
.
In June 2019, both COO
Barney Harford
Barney Merrick Harford (born 1972) is a British–American technology executive. Harford is a member of the board of directors for United Airlines and RealSelf.
Biography Early life and family
Harford was born in Greenwich, England, and rais ...
and CMO Rebecca Messina stepped down. In July 2019, the marketing department was reduced by a third, with the layoff of 400 people amid continued losses. Engineer hires were frozen. In early September 2019, Uber laid off an additional 435 employees with 265 coming from the engineering team and another 170 from the product team.
In 2020, Uber announced plans to become an emission-free platform. Uber introduced Uber Green, promoting users to choose electric and hybrid vehicles.
In January 2020, Uber acquired
Careem
Careem is a Dubai-based super app with operations in over 100 cities, covering 12 countries across the Middle East, Africa, and South Asia regions. The company, which was valued at over billion in 2018, became a wholly-owned subsidiary of Uber ...
for $3.1 billion.
In the same month, Uber sold its Indian Uber Eats operations to
Zomato
Zomato () is an Indian multinational restaurant aggregator and food delivery company founded by Deepinder Goyal and Pankaj Chaddah in 2008. Zomato provides information, menus and user-reviews of restaurants as well as food delivery options fro ...
, in exchange for 9.99% of Zomato.
Also in January 2020, Uber tested a feature that enabled drivers at the Santa Barbara, Sacramento, and Palm Springs airports to set fares based on a multiple of Uber's rates for UberX and UberXL trips.
On May 5, 2020, during the
COVID-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identi ...
, Uber announced plans to lay off 3,700 employees, around 14% of its workforce. On May 18, 2020, 3,000 more job cuts and 45 office closures were announced. Around the same time, construction finished on Uber's new headquarters on Third Street in San Francisco's Mission Bay neighborhood, consisting of several 6- and 11-story buildings connected by bridges and walkways. Like various other office complexes in San Francisco, Uber's campus includes a public plaza, which the San Francisco Chronicle's architecture critic John King called the city's "best new public space", while praising the entire ensemble for its "low-key sophistication – not what you’d expect from a firm with a rapacious image."
In June 2020, Uber announced that it would manage the on-demand high-occupancy vehicle fleet for
Marin Transit
Marin Transit is a public bus agency in Marin County, California, in the United States. Originally formed in 1964 as Marin County Transit District (MCTD), Marin Transit was re-branded on 30 July 2007 and now provides a variety of fixed-route and de ...
SaaS
Software as a service (SaaS ) is a software licensing and delivery model in which software is licensed on a subscription basis and is centrally hosted. SaaS is also known as "on-demand software" and Web-based/Web-hosted software.
SaaS is con ...
partnership.
In July 2020, Uber, in partnership with its majority-owned Cornershop, launched Uber grocery delivery service in Latin America, Canada, Miami, and Dallas.
On December 1, 2020, Uber acquired
Postmates
Postmates is a food delivery service, founded in 2011, and acquired by Uber in 2020. It offers local delivery of restaurant-prepared meals and other goods. It is headquartered in San Francisco, California.
, Postmates operates in 2,940 U.S. ...
for $2.65 billion.
In October 2021, Uber acquired Drizly, an alcohol delivery service, for $1.1 billion in cash and stock. On January 20, 2022, Uber acquired Australian car-sharing company
Car Next Door
Uber Carshare is an Australian company that facilitates peer-to-peer car rental, a system by which individuals may rent privately owned vehicles on an hourly or daily basis to other registered users of the service. It currently operates in loc ...
.
In May 2022, Uber formed a partnership with IT Taxi, Italy's largest taxi dispatcher. Through the partnership, it was agreed that Uber would integrate with the dispatcher, adding 12,000 drivers to over 80 cities in the country.
On September 19, 2022, Uber announced that its fleet of vehicles in developed countries and regions such as Europe, Japan, South Korea, United States, Canada, etc. will be 100% all-electric by 2030 due to climate change. Drivers of fossil fuel vehicles at that time in those regions will be forced to switch to electric vehicles or otherwise will be forced to stop driving for the company entirely unless they later decide to switch to an EV. This is the first phase of Uber's plan to become 100% carbon-net-zero worldwide by 2040 due to climate change.
September 2022 security breach
On September 15, 2022, Uber discovered a security breach of its internal network. A
hacker
A hacker is a person skilled in information technology who uses their technical knowledge to achieve a goal or overcome an obstacle, within a computerized system by non-standard means. Though the term ''hacker'' has become associated in popu ...
, who identified himself as an 18-year-old, utilized social engineering to obtain an employee's credentials and gain access to the company's
VPN
A virtual private network (VPN) extends a private network across a public network and enables users to send and receive data across shared or public networks as if their computing devices were directly connected to the private network. The be ...
powershell
PowerShell is a task automation and configuration management program from Microsoft, consisting of a command-line shell and the associated scripting language. Initially a Windows component only, known as Windows PowerShell, it was made open-sou ...
scripts which contained administrative credentials which gave them access to Uber's services such as
Amazon Web Services
Amazon Web Services, Inc. (AWS) is a subsidiary of Amazon that provides on-demand cloud computing platforms and APIs to individuals, companies, and governments, on a metered pay-as-you-go basis. These cloud computing web services provide d ...
and
Google Cloud Google Cloud Platform offers numerous integrated cloud-computing services, including compute, network, and storage.
Products
Past and present products under the Google Cloud platform include:
Current
* Google Cloud Datastore, a NoSQL databa ...
. The individual announced the hack on an internal Slack channel, where many employees thought it was a joke. In a statement on September 16, Uber indicated that there was no evidence that user data was compromised, all services were operational and law enforcement had been notified. Additionally, Uber uses services of
HackerOne
HackerOne is a vulnerability coordination and bug bounty platform that connects businesses with penetration testers and cybersecurity researchers. It was one of the first companies, along with Synack and Bugcrowd, to embrace and utilize crowd-sou ...
, a Californian bug bounty platform that employs ethical hackers to help identify bugs and protect the systems of many big companies.
Former operations
Self-driving cars
Uber ATG/Advanced Technologies Group, minority-owned by
SoftBank Vision Fund
The SoftBank Vision Fund is a venture capital fund founded in 2017 that is part of the SoftBank Group. With over $100 billion in capital, it is the world's largest technology-focused investment fund. In 2019, SoftBank Vision Fund 2 was founded. T ...
,
Toyota
is a Japanese multinational automotive manufacturer headquartered in Toyota City, Aichi, Japan. It was founded by Kiichiro Toyoda and incorporated on . Toyota is one of the largest automobile manufacturers in the world, producing about 10 ...
self-driving car
A self-driving car, also known as an autonomous car, driver-less car, or robotic car (robo-car), is a car that is capable of traveling without human input.Xie, S.; Hu, J.; Bhowmick, P.; Ding, Z.; Arvin, F.,Distributed Motion Planning for S ...
s. In early 2015, the company hired approximately 50 people from the
robotics
Robotics is an interdisciplinary branch of computer science and engineering. Robotics involves design, construction, operation, and use of robots. The goal of robotics is to design machines that can help and assist humans. Robotics integrate ...
self-driving car
A self-driving car, also known as an autonomous car, driver-less car, or robotic car (robo-car), is a car that is capable of traveling without human input.Xie, S.; Hu, J.; Bhowmick, P.; Ding, Z.; Arvin, F.,Distributed Motion Planning for S ...
s in
Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Western Pennsylvania, the second-most populous city in Pennsylva ...
using a fleet of Ford Fusion cars and on December 14, 2016, it began testing self-driving
Volvo XC90
The Volvo XC90 is a mid-size luxury SUV manufactured and marketed by Volvo Cars since 2002 and now in its second generation.
The first generation was introduced at the 2002 North American International Auto Show and used the Volvo P2 platform ...
SUVs in San Francisco. After the
California Department of Motor Vehicles
The California Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) is the state agency that registers motor vehicles and boats and issues driver licenses in the U.S. state of California. It regulates new car dealers (through the New Motor Vehicle Board), c ...
forced the program to cease operations a week later, the program was moved to
Arizona
Arizona ( ; nv, Hoozdo Hahoodzo ; ood, Alĭ ṣonak ) is a state in the Southwestern United States. It is the 6th largest and the 14th most populous of the 50 states. Its capital and largest city is Phoenix. Arizona is part of the Fou ...
. In March 2018, it paused testing after the
death of Elaine Herzberg
The death of Elaine Herzberg (August 2, 1968 – March 18, 2018) was the first recorded case of a pedestrian fatality involving a self-driving car, after a collision that occurred late in the evening of March 18, 2018. Herzberg was pushing a bic ...
in
Tempe, Arizona
, settlement_type = City
, named_for = Vale of Tempe
, image_skyline = Tempeskyline3.jpg
, imagesize = 260px
, image_caption = Tempe skyline as se ...
. Uber restarted testing in December 2018 after receiving local approval in
Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Western Pennsylvania, the second-most populous city in Pennsylva ...
and
Toronto
Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the anch ...
. In January 2021, with Uber ATG described as a "cash-burn machine", the division was sold to Aurora Innovation for $4 billion and Uber invested $400 million into Aurora, taking a 26% ownership stake.
self-driving truck
A self-driving truck, also known as an autonomous truck, or robo-truck is an application of self-driving car designed to transport cargo without requiring no human driver. Many companies are testing self-driving semi trucks.
In September 2022, ' ...
company, for $625 million. Ottomotto was founded by
Anthony Levandowski
Anthony Levandowski (born March 15, 1980) is a French-American self-driving car engineer. In 2009, Levandowski co-founded Google's self-driving car program, now known as Waymo, and was a technical lead until 2016. In 2016, he co-founded and so ...
, previously of
Waymo
Waymo LLC, formerly known as the Google self-driving car project, is an American autonomous driving technology company headquartered in Mountain View, California. It is a subsidiary of Alphabet Inc, the parent company of Google.
Waymo oper ...
, who allegedly founded Ottomotto using trade secrets he downloaded while at Waymo. In February 2018, to settle a lawsuit regarding the stolen trade secrets, Uber gave Waymo $244 million in stock and agreed not to infringe on Waymo's intellectual property. Uber cancelled its self-driving truck program in July 2018.
In June 2022, Uber struck a deal with Waymo to use the latter's technology for autonomous trucks in Uber's Freight service.
Air services
In October 2019, in partnership with HeliFlight, Uber offered 8-minute
helicopter
A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning rotors. This allows the helicopter to take off and land vertically, to hover, and to fly forward, backward and laterally. These attributes ...
flights between Manhattan and
John F. Kennedy International Airport
John F. Kennedy International Airport (colloquially referred to as JFK Airport, Kennedy Airport, New York-JFK, or simply JFK) is the main international airport serving New York City. The airport is the busiest of the seven airports in the Avia ...
for $200-$225 per passenger.
In December 2020, Uber sold its Elevate division, which was developing short flights using
VTOL
A vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) aircraft is one that can take off and land vertically without relying on a runway. This classification can include a variety of types of aircraft including helicopters as well as thrust-vectoring fixed-wi ...
aircraft, to
Joby Aviation
Joby Aviation is a United States venture-backed aviation company, developing an electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft that it intends to operate as an air taxi service. Joby Aviation is headquartered in Santa Cruz, California, a ...
.
Uber Rent
Uber Rent, powered by
Getaround
Getaround is an online car sharing or peer-to-peer carsharing service that connects drivers who need to reserve cars with car owners who share their cars in exchange for payment.
As of 2019, the company was reported to have five million users and ...
, was a
peer-to-peer carsharing
Peer-to-peer carsharing (also known as person-to-person carsharing and peer-to-peer car rental) is the process whereby existing car owners make their vehicles available for others to rent for short periods of time.
The concept
Peer-to-peer carsh ...
service available to some users in San Francisco between May 2018 and November 2018.
Uber Works
In October 2019, Uber launched Uber Works to connect workers who wanted temporary jobs with businesses. The app was initially available only in
Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
, image_map =
, map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago
, coordinates =
, coordinates_footnotes =
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name ...
and expanded to Miami in December 2019. The service was shut down in May 2020.
Uber AI
In December 2016, Uber launched Uber AI, a division for researching AI technologies and machine learning. Uber AI created multiple open source projects, such a Pyro Ludwig an Plato Uber AI also developed new AI techniques and algorithms, such as th POET algorithm and their sequence of papers on neuroevolution. Uber AI was shut down in May 2020 in order to refocus on Uber's core operations in an effort to recover financial losses dealt by the
COVID-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identi ...
.
Controversies
Ignoring and evading local regulations
Uber has been criticized for its strategy of generally commencing operations in a city without regard for local regulations. If faced with regulatory opposition, Uber called for public support for its service and mounted a political campaign, supported by
lobbying
In politics, lobbying, persuasion or interest representation is the act of lawfully attempting to influence the actions, policies, or decisions of government officials, most often legislators or members of regulatory agencies. Lobbying, which ...
, to change regulations. Uber argued that it is "a
technology company
A technology company (or tech company) is an electronics-based technological company, including, for example, business relating to digital electronics, software, and internet-related services, such as e-commerce services.
Details
According to '' ...
" and not a taxi company, and therefore it was not subject to regulations affecting taxi companies. Uber's strategy was generally to "seek forgiveness rather than permission". In 2014, with regards to airport pickups without a permit in California, drivers were actually told to ignore local regulations and that the company would pay for any citations. Uber's response to California Assembly Bill 5 (2019), whereby it announced that it would not comply with the law, then engaged lobbyists and mounted an expensive public opinion campaign to overturn it via a ballot, was cited as an example of this policy. Taxi companies sued Uber in numerous American cities, alleging that Uber's policy of violating taxi regulations was a form of unfair competition or a violation of antitrust law. Although some courts did find that Uber intentionally violated the taxi rules, Uber prevailed in every case, including the only case to proceed to trial.
In March 2017, an investigation by ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'' revealed that Uber developed a software tool called "Greyball" to avoid giving rides to known law enforcement officers in areas where its service was illegal such as in
Portland, Oregon
Portland (, ) is a port city in the Pacific Northwest and the list of cities in Oregon, largest city in the U.S. state of Oregon. Situated at the confluence of the Willamette River, Willamette and Columbia River, Columbia rivers, Portland is ...
South Korea
South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korean Peninsula and sharing a land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed by the Yellow Sea, while its eas ...
, and China. The tool identified government officials using
geofencing
A geofence is a virtual perimeter for a real-world geographic area. A geofence could be dynamically generated (as in a radius around a point location) or match a predefined set of boundaries (such as school zones or neighborhood boundaries).
Th ...
, mining credit card databases, identifying devices, and searches of social media. While at first, Uber stated that it only used the tool to identify riders that violated its terms of service, after investigations by
Portland, Oregon
Portland (, ) is a port city in the Pacific Northwest and the list of cities in Oregon, largest city in the U.S. state of Oregon. Situated at the confluence of the Willamette River, Willamette and Columbia River, Columbia rivers, Portland is ...
, and the
United States Department of Justice
The United States Department of Justice (DOJ), also known as the Justice Department, is a federal executive department of the United States government tasked with the enforcement of federal law and administration of justice in the United Stat ...
, Uber admitted to using the tool to skirt local regulations and promised not to use the tool for that purpose. The use of Greyball in London was cited by Transport for London as one of the reasons for its decision not to renew Uber's private hire operator licence in September 2017. A January 2018 report by
Bloomberg News
Bloomberg News (originally Bloomberg Business News) is an international news agency headquartered in New York City and a division of Bloomberg L.P. Content produced by Bloomberg News is disseminated through Bloomberg Terminals, Bloomberg Tele ...
stated that Uber routinely used a "panic button" system, codenamed "Ripley", that locked, powered off and changed passwords on staff computers when those offices were subjected to government raids. Uber allegedly used this button at least 24 times, from spring 2015 until late 2016.
Counter-intelligence research on class action plaintiffs
In 2016 Uber hired the global security consulting firm Ergo to secretly investigate plaintiffs involved in a class action lawsuit. Ergo operatives posed as acquaintances of the plaintiff's counsel and tried to contact their associates to obtain information that could be used against them. The result of which was found out causing the judge to throw out evidence obtained as obtained in a fraudulent manner.
Sexual harassment allegations and management shakeup (2017)
On February 19, 2017, former Uber engineer Susan Fowler published on her website that she was propositioned for sex by a manager and subsequently threatened with
termination of employment
Termination of employment or separation of employment is an employee's departure from a job and the end of an employee's duration with an employer. Termination may be voluntary on the employee's part, or it may be at the hands of the employer, of ...
by another manager if she continued to report the incident. Kalanick was alleged to have been aware of the complaint. On February 27, 2017,
Amit Singhal
Amitabh Kumar "Amit" Singhal (born September 1968) is a former senior vice president at Google Inc. having been a Google Fellow and the head of Google's Search team for 15 years.sexual harassment claim against him that occurred while he served as Vice President of
Google Search
Google Search (also known simply as Google) is a search engine provided by Google. Handling more than 3.5 billion searches per day, it has a 92% share of the global search engine market. It is also the most-visited website in the world.
The ...
. After investigations led by former attorney general
Eric Holder
Eric Himpton Holder Jr. (born January 21, 1951) is an American lawyer who served as the 82nd Attorney General of the United States from 2009 to 2015. Holder, serving in the administration of President Barack Obama, was the first African Amer ...
and
Arianna Huffington
Arianna Stassinopoulos Huffington (née Ariadnē-Anna Stasinopoúlou, el, Αριάδνη-Άννα Στασινοπούλου ; born July 15, 1950) is a Greek-American author, syndicated columnist and businesswoman. She is a co-founder of '' Th ...
, a member of Uber's board of directors, in June 2017, Uber fired over 20 employees. Kalanick took an indefinite leave of absence but, under pressure from investors, he resigned as CEO a week later. Also departing the company in June 2017 was
Emil Michael
Emil G. Michael ( ar, إيميل مايكل ; born September 19, 1972) is an Egyptian-born American businessman. Michael was the Senior Vice President of Business and Chief Business Officer at Uber, and the Chief Operating Officer of Klout.
Ea ...
, a senior vice president who suggested that Uber hire a team of opposition researchers and journalists, with a million-dollar budget, to "dig up dirt" on the personal lives and backgrounds of journalists who reported negatively on Uber, specifically targeting
Sarah Lacy
Sarah Ruth Lacy (born December 29, 1975) is an American technology journalist and author.
Early life
Lacy received her B.A. in literature from Rhodes College.
Career
Lacy is the former co-host of web video show Yahoo! Tech Ticker and was a colum ...
, editor of
PandoDaily
PandoDaily, or simply Pando, was a web publication offering technology news, analysis, and commentary, with a focus on Silicon Valley and startup companies.
History
PandoDaily was started by former TechCrunch writer Sarah Lacy on January 16, 201 ...
, who, in an article published in October 2014, accused Uber of
sexism
Sexism is prejudice or discrimination based on one's sex or gender. Sexism can affect anyone, but it primarily affects women and girls.There is a clear and broad consensus among academic scholars in multiple fields that sexism refers pri ...
and
misogyny
Misogyny () is hatred of, contempt for, or prejudice against women. It is a form of sexism that is used to keep women at a lower social status than men, thus maintaining the societal roles of patriarchy. Misogyny has been widely practice ...
in its advertising. In August 2018, Uber agreed to pay a total of $7 million to settle claims of gender discrimination, harassment, and hostile work environment, with 480 employees and former employees receiving $10,700 each and 56 of those employees and former employees receiving an additional $33,900 each. In December 2019, Kalanick resigned from the board of directors of the company and sold his shares.
Delayed disclosure of data breaches
On February 27, 2015, Uber admitted that it had suffered a data breach more than nine months prior. Names and license plate information from approximately 50,000 drivers were inadvertently disclosed. Uber discovered this leak in September 2014, but waited more than five months to notify the affected individuals.
An announcement in November 2017 revealed that in 2016, a separate data breach had disclosed the personal information of 600,000 drivers and 57 million customers. This data included names, email addresses, phone numbers, and drivers' license information. Hackers used employees' usernames and passwords that had been compromised in previous breaches (a "
credential stuffing
Credential stuffing is a type of cyberattack in which the attacker collects stolen account credentials, typically consisting of lists of usernames and/or email addresses and the corresponding passwords (often from a data breach), and then uses t ...
" method) to gain access to a private
GitHub
GitHub, Inc. () is an Internet hosting service for software development and version control using Git. It provides the distributed version control of Git plus access control, bug tracking, software feature requests, task management, continu ...
repository used by Uber's developers. The hackers located credentials for the company's
Amazon Web Services
Amazon Web Services, Inc. (AWS) is a subsidiary of Amazon that provides on-demand cloud computing platforms and APIs to individuals, companies, and governments, on a metered pay-as-you-go basis. These cloud computing web services provide d ...
datastore in the repository files, and were able to obtain access to the account records of users and drivers, as well as other data contained in over 100
Amazon S3
Amazon S3 or Amazon Simple Storage Service is a service offered by Amazon Web Services (AWS) that provides object storage through a web service interface. Amazon S3 uses the same scalable storage infrastructure that Amazon.com uses to run its ...
buckets. Uber paid a $100,000 ransom to the hackers on the promise they would delete the stolen data. Uber was subsequently criticized for concealing this data breach. Khosrowshahi publicly apologized. In September 2018, in the largest multi-state settlement of a data breach, Uber paid $148 million to the Federal Trade Commission, admitted that its claim that internal access to consumers' personal information was closely monitored on an ongoing basis was false, and stated that it had failed to live up to its promise to provide reasonable security for consumer data. Also in November 2018, Uber's British divisions were fined £385,000 (reduced to £308,000) by the
Information Commissioner's Office
The Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) is a non-departmental public body which reports directly to the Parliament of the United Kingdom and is sponsored by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS). It is the independe ...
.
In 2020, the
US Department of Justice
The United States Department of Justice (DOJ), also known as the Justice Department, is a federal executive department of the United States government tasked with the enforcement of federal law and administration of justice in the United Stat ...
announced criminal charges against former Chief Security Officer
Joe Sullivan
Michael Joseph O'Sullivan (November 4, 1906 – October 13, 1971) was an American jazz pianist.
Sullivan was the ninth child of Irish immigrant parents. He studied classical piano for 12 years and at age 17, he began to play popular music in si ...
for
obstruction of justice
Obstruction of justice, in United States jurisdictions, is an act that involves unduly influencing, impeding, or otherwise interfering with the justice system, especially the legal and procedural tasks of prosecutors, investigators, or other gov ...
. The criminal complaint said Sullivan arranged, with Kalanick's knowledge, to pay a ransom for the 2016 breach as a "bug bounty" to conceal its true nature, and for the hackers to falsify non-disclosure agreements to say they had not obtained any data.
2022 leak documenting misdeeds
More than 124,000 Uber documents covering the five-year period from 2012 to 2017 when Uber was run by its co-founder Travis Kalanick were leaked by Mark MacGann, a
lobbyist
In politics, lobbying, persuasion or interest representation is the act of lawfully attempting to influence the actions, policies, or decisions of government officials, most often legislators or members of regulatory agencies. Lobbying, which ...
who "led Uber's efforts to win over governments across Europe, the Middle East and Africa", to ''
The Guardian
''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...
'' newspaper and first printed on 10 July 2022 by its Sunday sister ''
The Observer
''The Observer'' is a British newspaper published on Sundays. It is a sister paper to ''The Guardian'' and '' The Guardian Weekly'', whose parent company Guardian Media Group Limited acquired it in 1993. First published in 1791, it is the ...
George Osborne
George Gideon Oliver Osborne (born Gideon Oliver Osborne; 23 May 1971) is a former British politician and newspaper editor who served as Chancellor of the Exchequer from 2010 to 2016 and as First Secretary of State from 2015 to 2016 in the ...
; how Emmanuel Macron secretly aided Uber lobbying in France, and use of a
kill switch
A kill switch, also known as an emergency stop (E-stop), emergency off (EMO) and as an emergency power off (EPO), is a safety mechanism used to shut off machinery in an emergency, when it cannot be shut down in the usual manner. Unlike a normal ...
during police raids to conceal data. Kalanick dismissed concerns from other executives that sending Uber drivers to a protest in France put them at risk of violence from angry opponents in the taxi industry, saying "I think it's worth it, violence guarantees success".
Status of employees
On October 25, 2022, New Zealand Employment Court Chief Judge Christina Inglis ruled that Uber drivers operating in New Zealand are employees rather than contractors, entitling them to a range of workers' rights and protections under New Zealand law. Inglis ruled in favor of four Uber drivers, who had challenged Uber's position that the drivers were independent contractors. The drivers were supported by trade unions
First Union
First Union Corporation was a bank holding company that provided commercial and retail banking services in eleven states in the eastern U.S. First Union also provided various other financial services, including mortgage banking, credit card, inv ...
and
E tū
E tū is a New Zealand trade union created in October 2015 through the merger of the Service & Food Workers Union, the Flight Attendants and Related Services Union, and the Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union
The Engineering, Print ...
, who welcomed the court ruling due to its international implications. In response, Uber expressed disappointment with the Employment Court's decision and confirmed that they would file an appeal.
Environmental Concerns
All vehicles in the US are required to receive certification for compliance from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) before they are sold, which includes all Uber vehicles. However, the EPA will also be adopting regulations on vehicle emissions. On the state level, Uber is already adhering to new regulations like California’s Clean Miles Standard, which requires at least 90% of the miles traveled by rideshares to be in zero emission vehicles by 2030. Ubers in Europe’s transportation industry are required to follow both the European Commission (EC) and the United Nations Economic Commission (UN ECE) for Europe’s regulations on emissions. For example, London's Congestion Charge Zone and Ultra Low Emission Zone charges fees for those who drive fossil-fueled vehicles which, as Uber explains in their 2022 10-K filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission,Uber Technologies, Inc. (2022, February 24). ''Form 10-K''. Mergent Intellect. https://www.mergentintellect.com/ makes it harder for them to retain drivers. Another recent update to Europe's regulations has been to reduce diesel emissions. However, these new green advancements in diesel engines could increase costs for drivers, riders, and Uber.
According to their 2022 10-K filing, Uber disclosed to their shareholders that their company is exposed to risks from climate change and that their business may be negatively affected by these risks. For example, their filing discusses public favorability for electric vehicles and low carbon business plans, and extreme weather and its impacts on the economy like decreased demand and supply-chain disruptions.
Uber's climate change initiatives include new programs like Uber Green. In a 2022 interview with the Toronto Star,The Toronto Star. (March 12, 2022). ''Uber Canada exec takes front seat; Fixing freight, going green - and his most-ordered meal deliveries.'' Nexis Uni. https://www.lexisnexis.com/ Uber's Senior Vice President of Mobility and Business Operations Andrew Macdonald explained that Uber Green gives riders an option to choose a zero or low-emission vehicle for their ride for an extra fee, while Uber gives drivers an extra dollar for every trip done in an electric vehicle. Uber has also committed to using only renewable energy in all of their U.S. offices by 2025, having net zero emissions for their corporate operations by 2023, and being a net zero company by 2040. However, Uber also explained in their 2022 10-K filing that while they are committed to combating climate change by investing their time and resources, they would accelerate or delay their initiatives if they faced uncontrollable circumstances. For example, during the coronavirus pandemic, they explained that they were unable to devote resources to their climate change commitments. Uber acknowledges in this filing how failing to attain their climate-related goals could negatively impact their costs, operations, and company image overall.