Benedict Evans got the cost of driverless cars to something like 0.40 cents/mile if I'm not mistaken.
Also another option for Uber should have been shared trips, which should have(?) network effects , but they don't seem to do very well at that , compared to the competition .
>Benedict Evans got the cost of driverless cars to something like 0.40 cents/mile if I'm not mistaken.
The article I mentioned was referring to roughly a "retail/end customer cost per mile", where Benedict Evans is probably referring to internal / wholesale costs.
Either way, it's probably the same conclusion, cutting costs by roughly 50%.
The problem with shared trips, I think, is that customers just don't want them in any great quantities. They don't want to be in very close quarters with randos. They don't want to wait while someone else gets picked up or dropped off.
>> They don't want to be in very close quarters with randos.
Maybe for shared rides , UBER should only assign vehicles that, allow people to sit with enough personal space,wider, for example a minivan, but make sure the middle seat is empty. That, combined with a culture of phone staring may make the experience neutral ?
>> They don't want to wait while someone else gets picked up or dropped off.
Most of the complaints on twitter are on the first problem you mentioned. So maybe solving it would make the service "good enough" , for the more cost-consious custuomers, and that's a big market.
Also another option for Uber should have been shared trips, which should have(?) network effects , but they don't seem to do very well at that , compared to the competition .