Hacker News Reader

I haven't seen the data, but I bet a huge percentage of it is subsidized rides. They essentially use free rides as a carrot for users to learn the value of Uber.

The great part for Uber is that once they've trained their userbase, that cost largely disappears.

View on HN

Walmart tactics.

Open in new town. Sell at a loss to get customers. Go on hiring spree.

Local business can't survive the mass exodus of customers and employees.

Once the only job in town is Walmart and the only store left is Walmart you slowly raise prices and profit.

Walmart has a profit margin of less than 4%. They are aggressive about controlling costs, which small-time companies can't compete with.

They'll compete by taking losses their competitors can't handle until they go out of business.

I suppose I'm not disagreeing with you, just pointing out WalMart's competitors are one of the costs they aggressively control :)

Also to keep drivers more motivated than they'd otherwise be. I'd say that they're trading VC money with drivers in order to have a dominant position by the time the drivers are no longer required.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com