For those of you interested in Uber, this is from Joshua Gans:
Is Uber really in a fight to the death?: In recent days, since their PR troubles, there has been much discussion as to why Uber seems to be so aggressive. Reasons ranged from being inept, to the challenges of fighting politics against taxi regulations to a claim that Uber’s market has a ‘winner take all’ nature. It is this last one that is of particular interest because it suggests that Uber has to fight hard against competitors like Lyft or it will lose. It also suggests that Uber’s $20 billion odd valuation is based on beliefs that it will win, and win big.
I am not sure that this is really the case. Despite the name ‘Uber’ connoting, ‘one Uber to rule them all,’ the theory underlying the notion of winner take all is rather special and is far from being proven in cases like this. …
Is Uber really in a fight to the death?: In recent days, since their PR troubles, there has been much discussion as to why Uber seems to be so aggressive. Reasons ranged from being inept, to the challenges of fighting politics against taxi regulations to a claim that Uber’s market has a ‘winner take all’ nature. It is this last one that is of particular interest because it suggests that Uber has to fight hard against competitors like Lyft or it will lose. It also suggests that Uber’s $20 billion odd valuation is based on beliefs that it will win, and win big.
I am not sure that this is really the case. Despite the name ‘Uber’ connoting, ‘one Uber to rule them all,’ the theory underlying the notion of winner take all is rather special and is far from being proven in cases like this. …
posted from Bloggeroid
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