Broken Moats on X
Deliveries from a teetering on insolvency Lucid is the savior for $UBER? ill take the under 0, 100 or 500 lucid AVs for Uber will not change the incumbency problem for UBER. They will now have to share the market of ride share, and ultimately last mile delivery that they currently dominate with Waymo, Tesla, Zoom (Amazon) in addition to many other players. These are well financed players that can use their mobility solution as part of a broader consumer bundle (not uberone, but incorporated into Prime). Removing the cost of drivers in the equation will dramatically lower the cost and likely the gross profit dollars available to Uber in a now hyper competitive market with companies that dwarf their capital base to run them out with subsidies, bundling and marketing (the same tactics uber used a decade ago to squeeze out smaller players). Their advantage of mindshare currently will be eroded by price and Uber does not control their own tech (bad for their economic model v competitors), is behind and will remain behind in terms of tech due to their inability to fund AI/AV at the same level as their new competitors. The concept Uber will win from fragmentation of AVs and being the app consolidator is going to be very difficult to play out. The regulatory hurdles, and costs of being 6 months behind and almost as safe at a higher price is not going to be a collection of vehicles attractive to users overtime, nor will their privellaged position as the app you open with little consideration to book a ride. And in an agent world, you wont pull up an app you'll ask book me the cheapest ride to the airport (and Uber wont win that box as discussed, app mindshare and learned behavior is meaningless) Uber won't be able to invest or subsidize their rides to stay relevant with Waymo/Tesla/Amazon for very long. Uber and their management team missed the boat (ironically by winning short term profits and street fanfare in cutting all of their AV investments several years ago) and the risk is not they stay in second and you melt the ice cube of cash flows here, this is existential like the sony walkman when the iPod arrived. So keep hoping for Lucid and the Saudis to come, it won't matter in the end. There is a reason it has underperformed and now trades in line with Software (recent move lines up with squeeze in SMH).
