There are two things I've always wanted: A personal driver and a private jet. Well, I think it is safe to say that I've achieved one of my goals, a private driver on-demand.
This past week I was on business in San Francisco and one of my colleagues introduced me to uber. I had the chance to use it 4 times while in San Fran and it worked seamlessly, I was sold. I was in a state of awe as I learned about the service from my friend and from the drivers themselves. I must've pinged the drivers with 20 questions every time I rode in one of their cars. How do you like it? Are you making money? What is the vetting process like? All of the drivers all had very positive things to say about the company and working for them. (note: I also asked taxi drivers that I interacted with during the week and they have a animalistic hatred for the service, not surprisingly. In fact, I wonder if the taxi lobby will throw their weight around to make life harder for uber into the future.) But I digress.
The greatness of this service goes beyond the fact that you can have a clean, luxury towncar at your doorstep in minutes (granted they are in your City).
The real power of this system is the complete transparency. I know who the driver is and his status the second I request a car, I can track him as he is on his way with the ETA updating, I know his rating, what he looks like. The only thing I dont know at that point is what the ride will cost me, because he does not know my destination at that moment. Looks like it is about 1.5 times the cost of a taxi, but so worth it. And, the rating system keeps him honest. I rated a driver 2 stars in San Fran because he took an inefficient route and uber refunded me 20% of my fare without me asking.
And the kicker for me was that I learned from one of the drivers that they rate their passengers. Wait, what? You rate your passengers so that other drivers can make an informed decision on whether or not to pick them up? Wow. To me, amongst the brilliance of the service, this to me was the piece de resistance. Imagine in your industry if you and your competitors could rate the customer pool to determine if you will invest your time and energy in their business? Passengers are rated on the same 5-star system and can be dinged for giving inaccurate directions, leaving the car dirty, being rude to the driver or other promiscous activities in the back seat of the towncar.
uber is a company that I plan on using frequently in the markets they serve. I also look forward to tracking their iterations and growth. In fact, they've already gone through a logo change as they released a new logo this week. And with a general name like uber, it makes me wonder if they have long-term plans to bring the on-demand concept to other services. Let's hope.
Jeeves, gas the car.
Update: Just announced is another $32M round for European expansion: Expansion costs money, and the company just got a lot more: $32 million in a new round of funding led by Menlo Ventures. Also participating is Bezos Expeditions, Goldman Sachs, and some earlier investors. There's an option to expand to $39 million if necessary.
