Uber-ception

Didi Chuxing, the Chinese ridesharing app with over 600 million users in 15 countries, is finalising preparations for a US IPO. Currently valued at US$90b in the private market, Didi will become one of the biggest IPO’s in history.

The ironic part? Its closest competitor, Uber, is set to make a pretty penny from the deal. As early as the beginning of this year, Uber held a 15% stake in Didi. It sold roughly 8% of this stake for US$500m, maintaining a 12% position.

Uber is revealing itself to be more than just ridesharing and food delivery. Early Uber had visions of a robo-taxi network powered by self-driving cars, delivery drones and air-taxi services. They have given up on developing such technologies in-house and are investing in promising startups that can focus solely on these projects.

They most recently invested in Waabi, a female-founded self-driving technology company. This is on top of other self-driving technology companies like Aurora. In late 2020, they sold their own “helicopter” business Elevate and invested US$125m into Joby Aviation.

The possibility to shape and power future markets may appeal to investors as Uber becomes decreasingly competitive. The “age of disruption” will quickly end if prices maintain their 40% yoy increase. The company attributes a labour shortage to the price rises in the States.