UberEats winning partnerships

UberEats winning partnerships, Getir struggles, Cruise on the offensive, and podcasts.

Ride-Hailing & Taxi, Buses & DRT 🚙🚐

Spare, Via and now RideCo - partner with Uber for ‘transit agencies overflow’ - allowing usage of Uber’s vehicle supply on microtransit / paratransit services when it makes more sense than sending a larger transit vehicle.

Didi Q1/23 report: 19.1% revenue growth YoY and 90% decline in net loss to ±$160M. Note that Q1/22 saw a ±$1.2bn(!) fine from the government, hence the steep decline in net loss.

RideTandem raises £2.3M, bringing total funding to £6M. RideTandem is on way for £1M ARR.

The Routing Company launched Pingo Access, a paratransit solution with dedicated features. Uride expands in Canada. FreeNow starts in Zaragoza. Casablanca’s (Morocco) local government accuses Yango of breaking local laws for operating unlicensed vehicles and unprofessional drivers. Ola rolls out a no-cancellation premium service, Prime+, in Bangalore. The service is planned to expand to additional cities. Uber’s CFO is stepping down. Next CFO will need to keep an eye on profit.

In Sydney, Australia, ride-hailing is back to pre-pandemic levels - local players include Uber, Ola, Didi and Shebah, an all-women ride-hailing. In Melbourne, Didi is offering one free ride per week. This follows a surprise hike in public transportation prices.

Sharing/renting 🚗🛴

Free2move expands its European presence to countries such as Slovenia, Greece, and Romania, working in partnership with major importers of Stellantis brands in the respective regions.

In the UK, Co Cars and Co Bikes collapsed into administration. Company cites increasing fuel costs and cost of living, post-pandemic changing travel behaviour, drop in demand for business travel, and vandalism - made it "impossible" to remain viable.

Spanish Hoop Carpool raises €1.2M to increase presence in Spain and expand to Portugal, Mexico and Columbia. The company aims to achieve a €1 million turnover within the next year.

Micromobility 🚲🛴

Swing operates 100,000 e-scooters (85K), e-bikes (14K) and e-mopeds (1K) across 70 South Korean cities. The company is profitable and targeting $100M in revenue this year. Read an interview with the COO.

Revel brings back electric mopeds to the Bronx. The company left because of thefts, and its solution is to limit the service area. Bird pulls out of Worcestershire. Lime in Bosie.

Delivery 🍽🧺

UberEats partners with Domino’s Pizza. Domino’s has its own in-house delivery operation and will keep doing so - but now orders can be made via the UberEats and Postmates app, effectively treating these apps as a way to reach more customers. This is the 1st time Domino’s partners with a 3rd party app in the US (there are similar existing partnerships in international markets), unlike its main competitors. Uber will enjoy exclusivity until the end of 2024. A small scale pilot to begin soon, with aim to have a US wide service and extend partnership to international markets by end of 2023.

In the UK, UberEats partnered with supermarket Waitrose for 20 minute deliveries. Starting from specific neighbourhoods in London, the partnership is expected to extend to 200 shops across Great Britain. Just-Eat-Takeaway partnered with supermarket Nisa for 30 minute deliveries. A look at similar partnerships across the UK.

After France, Portugal and Spain - Getir might be pulling out of Italy and the Netherlands and shutting down warehouses in the UK. Getir is looking to cut costs and raise an additional investment to keep afloat.

Swiggy acquires LYNK Logistics, a retail distribution company, entering the FMCG retail space via acquisition. LYNK works with over 100,000 retail stores across eight major Indian cities. Starship Technologies claim its bots can now wireless charge, allowing greater cost reductions (no humans needed to charge). Foodpanda plans to expand its in-store grocery pickups to Bangladesh and Pakistan.

Autonomous & remote-driving 🤖℡

California again delayed the vote to extend autonomous operations across San Francisco - of which the city is objecting to - and Cruise and Waymo moved to offence. Cruise led with newspaper ads reading “Humans are terrible drivers”; Waymo merely published a blog post on the dangers of humans’ tendency to speed. Both highlight their safety record, but it isn’t safety that concerns the people and officials of San Francisco - autonomous vehicles tend to stop unexpectedly and obstruct traffic. AVs also lack the ability to get out of the way of emergency vehicles and to manage unexpected scenarios, like a police roadblock. Vote is now planned for August 10th.

In the UK, Ford is offering its motorways hands-off (level 2+ ADAS) system BlueCruise for a £18 subscription. Watch a Vay movie: teledriving a car in Berlin from Spain.

Last week the US, and this week Volkswagen’s ID.Buzz to start transporting passengers in Munich. Hawaii to launch first autonomous electric passenger shuttle. Volvo plans to launch truck autonomous operations in Texas. NHTSA (US) continues its investigation on Tesla’s Autopilot feature.

Flying cars 🚁

EHang secures $23M from a South Korean investor.

OEMs 🛺⚡️

Lucid is producing more cars than it is selling - and also producing and delivering less than Q4/22 and Q1/23 numbers. Lucid’s two pressing challenges: low demand for Lucid’s cars and too many cars sitting ideal and depreciating.

Bolivian startup Quantum Motors is building an electric minicar in a lithium-rich country. The box-like car travels for 80km (50 miles) per charge at speeds of 55 km/h (35 mph) and costs $7,600.

Gig economy 💰

In New York City, a judge delays the rollout of delivery worker minimum wage law. Legislation was due to enter into effect July 12th, but DoorDash, Grubhub, Uber and Relay sued the city to stop the legislation. The companies claim (each one in its own way) that the bill is bad for business and will hurt restaurants, clients and even couriers… who would lose flexibility if paid per hour. Uber said: “We hope to use this time to work with the City and all stakeholders to figure out a minimum pay rule that doesn’t have devastating consequences for couriers, consumers and restaurants”.

In other news 📰

TechCrunch read on battery fires, what you can do to minimise risk and what actions the (US) government takes. Moovit expands in the US. DoorDash adds outside firms to its lobbying efforts.

Freakonomics had a great podcast on “Why is the US so good at killing pedestrians” (here) so I thought to compile a list of what I’m listening to in the transportation / urbanism space: Wunder Mobility, Autonocast, Micromobility, All About Mobility, Ride: Urban Mobility, Fully Charged, Cities First, Urbanistica, Transit Unplugged, No Parking, Wars on Cars, Fast Forward, and Smart in the City. Links are to Spotify.