Uber-board

It was four a.m. in the outskirt of Boston – the city of Malden – as we were preparing to head out to Logan airport for a flight back to Texas a few days ago.  My brother in law, who had always taken us to and from the airport many times in the past, will be spared the early wake up because that morning I wanted to see for myself what this latest hoopla in business innovation is all about.  With our bags by the hallway I tapped an icon App on the smart phone and typed origin and destination.  In less than a minute the screen came alive with the name of the driver with his photo, the model of the car he’s driving and license plate number, the estimated ‘fare’ and announcing that he’ll be arriving in five minutes.  Sure enough he did.  A few minutes later we unloaded our luggage right at the departure area where he helped to unload our bags, then a handshake and a tip – fare was taken care of by the credit card on file. Before our flight was to board I received an email with the receipt for the credit card charge and a thank you note from Uber. 

Uber – now quickly emerging as another word verb, like Google and others – is fast becoming a successful business model that can and will only function based on cyber technology but performing a service as basic as the transporting of people from A to B.  It was at first a curiosity to many, including myself, until one gets a firsthand experience of finding out what this new made up English word is all about.  Of course, in German it is a qualifier of sort – a superlative prefix for anything extremely above all others.  English speakers are content with over anything, i.e. over the top, over worked, over taxed, overlord, etc., but Uber could very well be the ultimate choice if not a better alternative to urban taxi service.  It is not a solution to mass transportation but it is as innovative as the subway system was over a hundred years ago. 

Uber, the company that is now the bane of taxi operators and even by the limo industry is an uber-example of entrepreneurship that carries on the idea that if necessity is the father of invention then it had just sired a child of technology.   Utterly impossible to pull off over a decade ago it is now a legitimately viable business because the light speed flow of information over the web makes it almost as easy as a short order at the fast food’s drive through.  Inevitably it will spark competition but Uber might remain the word to describe the ready-when-you-are transportation genre as coke had done with the soda industry, or fridge (for Frigidaire) in refrigeration, etc.

Uber, now a worldwide phenomenon, albeit mainly if not totally for urban consumption only, is not new of course.  The idea that it is in the transportation business but does not own a single vehicle is quite a feat but not entirely unfamiliar.  Amazon has been selling products, now outselling Walmart even, without the façade of a single physical store.  Nike had in the beginning sold a bunch of shoes without owning a shoe factory.  It is mainly a designer of footwear and outsourcing the production to some far flung Asian shoemakers was an uber-business idea.  I am not sure that Nike today even has its own shoe factory anywhere.  Mercenary armies in history had been employed for a fee and a dictator is able to impose his will without implicating or using his own military.

Angie’s List, Home Advisor, and others are a subtext to the main theme.  They provide the uber-shortcut to word-of-mouth.  Uber has also adopted the Star-rating system with a twist.  The passengers get to rate the driver but drivers too do get to rate their passengers.  This is the uber-equivalent of a two way street.  Uber, from what I understood from our driver, takes about three days to vet the prospective drivers who apply to drive – full or part time and at the hours and days they choose and the area they wish to cover.  Uber passengers need to sign up ahead and become an Uber user but the vetting only takes about 1-2 hours based on address and credit card information.  I’m sure Uber can access a lot of data, including credit and criminal, about you from just that basic information.  Car dealerships actually do the same thing.  Why the ratings on both sides?  Well, Uber probably likes to keep good drivers and drop those not in keeping with their standards; unruly, habitually un-ready, drunk passengers (passing out or throwing up in the car), etc. are also dropped from the service.  Uber is naturally the uber-clearing house.  When a passenger wishes to contact the driver, the phone number he or she calls is routed to Uber then to the driver and vice versa.  So the information is buffered between passenger and driver, except of course for just the necessary passenger name, location of pick up, driver’s name, car model and license plate.

Is this going to be the basis for most other business models in the future?   Naturally, as always, affected businesses are pushing back, including politicians beholden to the transportation business, as what seems to be happening with the New York mayor taking on Uber on behalf of the taxi and limo industry. Ultimately, the users of the service will determine the outcome.  For now, there is the attraction to the perceived safety and assured service from Uber.  The drivers are ordinary citizens, working part time and certainly not overworked to meet quotas as taxi drivers need to, who live within the neighborhood of the origination location; hence, they can pick up within five minutes or less.  The passenger knows ahead of time the estimated fare, and except for tips there is no exchange of cash and receipts are automatic.  For others it is like having a neighbor drive a school child or relative to and from locations with the safety of vetted drivers. Uber can tell when and where a passenger had arrived with the precision of a GPS.  When I got the receipt, it provided the route taken, how many miles were covered and the origination and destination times – something parents or relatives get instantly for a child pick up, for example, if a parent is running late or unable to for one reason or another, but the child gets to go to tennis or football practice or get picked up from the movie theater for a safe trip and assured arrival to the house.  Critics lament the absenteeism in parenting if one day that piano recital, the perfect catch of a baseball or football, or thrilling end to a tennis match are easily missed but unburdened by guilt because after all dad or mom did do everything to ensure the child will be safely home after not missing an activity because they were not around.  And that could be the problem because this could make it easier to not be around and yet feel good that their child is safe. 

This is not an endorsement for Uber but it is something to have in your back pocket just in case you find yourself in an unfamiliar urban setting somewhere and you need a ride.  It does not cost anything to apply but it could be crucial when the need arises. There is something about having a personal driver to take you to an unfamiliar place where finding a parking space becomes an unnecessary headache. 

Who knows what comes next?  We may not have been paying attention but a long, long time ago somebody came up with the idea to cook meals for you at a place that is not your home where you don’t need to clean up or wash the dishes. The place is now what we call a restaurant.  Then when we are really in such a hurry, we just drive through.  Somebody now does our laundry if we’re willing to pay for it.  The uber-doing of these chores is as much part of modern life as the symbiotic relationships between organisms of providers and recipients of services or material in exchange for something. Let’s hope we don’t uber-do it because someone is already thinking about robot nannies for our young.  But wait a minute!  Don’t we have televisions and video games already doing that?  We need to be careful because some are already doing the thinking for us through social media where we’re told what to say and not say, or do and not do.  Something we cannot do is out source our thinking because in the end our thoughts are all we have left if suddenly everything stops flowing through the ether, the airwaves and the web.  And thus begin the debate and the uber-thinking but there is the danger of the Gotterdammerung of civilized society, or any society for that matter when much of what we do is outsourced and when we lose that capability the landscape of our future is not going to be a pretty picture.