Uber

Jam Session
Magical Experience at Events
Fulvio Cozzi
About me
● DoorDash (2021-2023)
○ Feed ranking
○ ETAs
○ Growth
● Amazon (2014-2021)
○ Inventory guidance for Sellers
○ Inventory guidance for Amazon Retail
○ Inventory health
○ Middle mile network topology
○ Middle mile transportation scheduling
Fun fact about me
● Last time I gave a presentation was 10 years ago, explaining network topology,
without transportation background, on my first 30 days at Amazon….
Agenda
- Context
- Is this a problem worth solving?
- Users
- Problems
- Solutions
- Roll out / Metrics
Why?

Context

Uber
Ridesharing
- 2-sided marketplace of Riders and Drivers (+
Advertisers)
- Riders: seek reliable and affordable ways to move
from A to B
- Drivers: seek ways to generate dependable
earnings

Uber
Marketplace efficiency
- An efficient marketplace minimizes wait time for all sides
- Riders: get faster from A to B, at a more affordable price, with higher
certainty
- Drivers: spend more time earning (vs ‘open’: waiting for dispatch or
‘en-route’: driving for a pickup)
- Wait times are low when:
- Marketplace participation is high: there are many riders and drivers, so they are more
likely to be close to each other and are more efficiently matched
- Healthy Balance of riders and drivers: for a given time-geo, the number of ‘open’ cars is
comparable to the trip requests, so matches and pickups happen quickly

Uber
Marketplace efficiency for Events (1/3)
- Events might create a market imbalance between demand and supply
- Riders: request trips for the same place at the same time, usually close
to the event start / end time
- Drivers: receive a large number of requests close to the event start /
end time, receive few or no requests in between

Uber
Marketplace efficiency for Events (2/3)
- Some signs of a market imbalance:
- Higher requests per time period and geo location
- Higher ETAs
- Higher Prices
- Lower trip completion rate

Uber
Marketplace efficiency for Events (3/3)
- Rebalancing mechanisms (surge, Boost+, Quest) are somewhat effective
in delivering reliability and increasing supply
- Many challenges with events still remain unsolved:
- Congestion
- Road blocks
- Hard to reach designated pick up/drop off areas
- Riders and drivers unable to find each other
- Riders and drivers cancel on each other
- Riders can’t secure trips, drivers don’t feel compensated enough

Uber
North Star for this case study
- Product Goal: Create a magical experience at events for Riders and
Drivers
- Measured as: Wait time reduction for the network as a whole

Uber
Why?

Is this a problem worth solving?

Uber
Mission
- Magical experience for riders and drivers at
events is aligned to Uber’s mission to reimagine the
way the world moves for the better

Uber
Market attractiveness
Events have an attractive $4.5B Total Addressable Market (TAM) (23.3%
Uber mobility), TAM is expected to grow 5.6x by 2030 (data)

- 469 venues in the US with capacity 10k+ (data)

- 36k events yearly
- 549M attendees yearly (bottom-up estimate, events by type)

Uber
Right to win
Uber is well positioned to tackle the mobility challenge
- 74% rideshare market (as of: Aug-2023, source: Bloomberg)
- $4.9B in cash and cash equivalents
- $4.9B in mobility revenue
- 137M in Monthly Active Platform Consumers (MAPCs) (as of: Q2-2023, source:
Uber earnings report)
- In addition:
- World class demand and supply of transportation
- Smart matching, advanced routing and pricing
- Strong brand and safety record

Uber
Recommendation
Invest in improving Events

Uber
Why?

Users

Uber
Users
Riders
- Use case: sport events, concerts, festivals
- Who they ride with: solo, significant other, in group
- Engagement level: Uber One vs Classic
- Demographic: teenagers, adults, senior citizens
Drivers
- Use case: sport events, concerts, festivals
- Rating: Highly rated vs not
- Lifetime trips: 50+, 150+, 250+, 500+
- Type of service: UberX vs Uber Black

Event Staff: Venues, Organizers, Local Institutions

Uber: Operations, Customer Support, Trust & Safety
Uber
Users prioritization
User segments: Solve for Riders and Drivers
Here is why:
- Network effects: Uber gets more valuable as more people use it
- Riders: Uber gets more valuable the more drivers are on the
platform
- Drivers: Uber gets more valuable the more riders are on the
platform
- Cold start problem: if we solve for one side in isolation and users don’t
find who or what they want, they will eventually churn
Once the network is stable and can grow on its own, we can invest in better
tooling for internal operators and Event Staff
Uber
Use case prioritization
Use case: Solve for Sport events
Here is why:
- Really high TAM → we can make the highest impact
- Somewhat deterministic demand → we can better plan supply
- High share of repeat users → highest lifetime value (LTV)

Uber
Why?

Problems

Uber
User Research: Drivers (1/2)
Uber Drivers hate working for Events

Surveyed Drivers on Reddit (#1, #2) and Uberpeople.net on what’s like to

work for Events. Received 28 responses:
- 93% (26) reported a negative experience
- 7% (2) were more balanced
Key themes:
- Traffic, long lines and road blocks create really an awful experience
- Drivers are upset with Uber, Riders and Event Staff
- Uber: not offering big surges that used to make events worth it
- Riders: not waiting at the correct spot, not cooperating
- Event Staff: Organizers poorly organizing events and Law
Enforcement flexing their power

Uber
User Research: Drivers (2/2)

Uber
User Research: Riders (1/2)
Uber Riders don’t enjoy riding to or from Events

Performed a closed-ended survey on what’s like to ride to or from Events. Received 12

responses:
- 9 reported a subpar experience (2 stars or below on a scale of 5)
- 2 reported an ok experience (3 stars)
- 1 reported a positive experience (4 stars or above)
Key themes:
- 8 out of 12 found riding from an event more challenging than riding to an event
- 6 out of 12 struggled to secure a ride from the event

Uber
User Research: Riders (2/2)

Uber
User journey
Riding to a sport event:
- Request
- Pickup
- Ride to event
- Drop off at event

Riding from a sport event:

- Request from event
- Pickup from event
- Ride
- Drop off

Uber
User journey prioritization
User journey: prioritize riding from a sport event (request + pickup)

Uber
Problems
Riding from a sport event:
- Request from event
- ETAs are too long
- Route is unfeasible
- Fare is too high (rider) too low (driver)
- Rider and driver not getting matched
- Received a cancellation
- Pickup from event
- ETAs are too long
- Route is unfeasible
- Can't find rider/driver
- Received a cancellation
- Rider/Driver unresponsive
- No/bad phone service
Uber
Problems prioritization
Problems: prioritize
- Request from event
- ETAs are too long
- Fare is too high / too low
- Rider and driver not getting
matched
- Received a cancellation
- Pickup from event
- ETAs are too long
- Received a cancellation

Uber
Why?

Solutions

Uber
Why this is a hard problem to solve
In the best case scenario, we need to facilitate 20 pickups per minute or 1
every 3 seconds, to absorb 15% of an event demand within 45 minutes.

Uber
Solutions (1/4)
Demand shaping (time)
- Riders are offered the option to schedule a ride through the Uber
app
- Trips can be scheduled when purchasing the ticket, as an upgrade,
for events where Uber partners with the Event Organizer
- Trips can also be scheduled when riders are in the event geofence
- Riders schedule trips through a time picker, the picker incentivizes
scheduling slots with low utilization
- ETAs and prices are used as incentives
- Larger incentives are offered for pickups before the event
completion

Uber
Solutions (2/4)
Demand shaping (space)
- Several designated pickup areas are created around the event in partnership with
Venues and Event Organizers
- Trips can be scheduled when purchasing the ticket, as an upgrade, for events where
Uber partners with the Event Organizer
- Trips can also be scheduled or booked on the spot when riders are in the event
geofence
- Trips are allocated to the area with the lowest utilization
- Riders receive walking directions to their pickup area through the app
- Directions are provided with richer details to the navigation basemap, including building
outlines, entrances and other features such as crosswalks
- Signs and on-site Uber operators facilitate the process

Uber
Solutions (3/4)
UberBus Shared
- UberBus Shared is a higher capacity vehicle service with fixed routes available the day of the
event only
- Trips can be scheduled ahead with the event tickets as an upgrade, or through the Uber
Explore tab
- Trips that have been scheduled ahead can be canceled free of charge up to 1 day before the
event
- Trips can be booked on the spot, through the Uber app, when there is available capacity and
the fixed route is compatible with trip origin/destination
- Trips can be booked for 1 or multiple people
- Trips pickup points have to be along the fixed route
- UberBus Shared uses higher capacity vehicles like vans (15 seats) and charter buses (56 seats)
to maximize asset utilization
- On the riders side, rides are 40% on average the price of an UberX Shared
- On the driver side, earnings are priced comparably to Uber Hourly Uber
Solutions (4/4)
UberPool Shared
- UberPool Shared brings online on the Uber platform all the supply of cars from event attendees
who aren’t registered as Uber drivers yet
- Car owners can sign up as drivers and start driving in 2 minutes or less through priority
onboarding
- Car owners can input their available seat capacity and drive as a one-off, getting paid through
their Uber rider payment method (if they are Uber riders) or Apple/Google Pay
- Riders and Drivers can decide to match with each other through the standard matching
algorithm or offline through QR codes
- The same safety features and upfront pricing will be available for these trips, irrespective of
how riders and drivers were matched

Uber
Solutions prioritization
Solutions: prioritize UberBus Shared

Uber
Why?

Rollout

Uber
Assumptions
Assumptions:
- Riders will be excited to take a higher capacity vehicle on a fixed route
to travel to and from the venue (riskiest)
- We will succeed in procuring sufficient supply of such vehicles (riskiest)
- Drivers will be excited to give up some flexibility in exchange for a
steady hourly income the day of the event
- We will succeed in operating the fleet
- Fewer vehicles on the road will decrease congestion, decreasing wait
time across the network (riskiest)

Uber
Phase 1
Riskiest assumption testing:
- Fewer vehicles on the road will decrease congestion, decreasing wait
time across the network (riskiest)

Methodology: marketplace simulation

Success:
- ETAs across the network <0
- Trip completion rate >=0
- Demand >=0
- Supply >=0
- Price <=0

Uber
Phase 2
Riskiest assumption testing:
- Riders will be excited to take a higher capacity vehicle on a fixed route to travel to and from the
venue (riskiest)
- We will succeed in procuring sufficient supply of such vehicles (riskiest)
Methodology: ops test
Ops test Instructions:
- Pick one basketball event in a smaller suburban venue in the US
- Design a fixed route from a high density departure point like a train station
- Partner with Event organizers to offer a $5 flat fare one way $7 round trip for the event
- Send marketing emails, riders to opt-in through a Google form
- Uber Ops teams on-site to facilitate pickups and dropoffs on the day of the event
- Partner with local institutions to hire school buses for the event
- School buses are attractive because their demand seasonality (weekdays mornings and early afternoons) is the
opposite of events (weekend late evenings and nights)
- Post-experience Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT) and 30-min qual assessment with both riders and drivers
Uber
Testing Goals
- Find Product Market Fit
(PMF) with both Riders and
Drivers
- Monitor entire funnel while
focusing on:
- Adoption
- # users purchasing
seats
- # users completing
their first ride
- Retention
- D28/D1
- D84/D7 Uber
Growth
Principles:
- Grow slowly, while retaining a large number of users
- Grow from one basketball event into more basketball events for the
same venue
- Grow into all sport events for the same venue
- Grow into more venues
- Grow into more use cases (concerts, festivals)
- Grow into more flexible mobility options
- Routes with multiple spots, pickups along the route
- More than one route, dynamically created based on demand and supply
- Dynamic routes, so pickups can happen when Riders request vs fixed points
- Integration with Uber transit, Uber Explore
- Ability for Uber to buy capacity and lease it to Drivers, help them grow Uber
Risks
Cannibalize the existing Uber mobility experience
- Riders might rely more on UberBus Shared and less on other mobility options
- Drivers might receive fewer trip requests
→ Not concerning, in line with Expanding Access and serving anyone’s need for mobility

Not offering door to door transportation

- Riders will still have to get from their home to the bus stop and back
→ Not concerning, we have seen how this could be mitigated, Providing Choice

Slower service
- Riders might have to wait for the bus to fill up
- Buses might be slower than other mobility options
- Drop offs might be more limited than other mobility options
→ Not concerning, it might be true for isolated cases, but not at a network level in the long run Uber
Why?

Thank you!

Uber