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The biggest unmentioned thing I'm noticing, is when are these car hailing apps going to start competing in how much of a cut they take? The marginal cost of their software is near %0.

When will amazon-uber come up and say to uber: "Your [20% profit] margin is my opportunity".

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The vast majority of that 20% goes into overheads associated with operating the service - e.g. insurance, background checks, etc.

What's left to cover engineering & profit is probably only 2-3%.

The drivers have to pay for their own insurance, so it's not that. Hard to see how a background check requires 20% of all revenue.

Uber has their own insurance as well, in case a driver isn't insured. And the "etc." part of what I said is probably no less than 100 major things, so seems pretty silly to to make that statement.

Do you have a source for that?

Yes - http://blog.uber.com/dynamicpricing

Rockefeller recognized that potential weakness in Standard Oil, that's why he focused on volume over margins. He knew that if Standard ran with high margins, he would be provided an opening for a competitor to best him.

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