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44 Transp. L.J. 33 (2017)
Will the Growth of Uber Increase Economic Welfare

handle is hein.journals/tportl44 and id is 41 raw text is: 










                                                                        Article


                             Will The Growth of Uber Increase

                                                    Economic Welfare?
















                                                                Hubert   Horan*




                                   ABSTRACT

     The  urban   car service  firm Uber   is currently the  most  highly valued
private  startup company in the world, with a venture capital valuation of
over  $68  billion based  on direct investment   of  over $13  billion' from  nu-
merous prominent Silicon Valley investors.2 Uber's investors are not

     * The author has forty years of experience as a manager and consultant in transportation,
primarily with airlines, but also railroads and urban transit. His full CV and publications can be
found at horanaviation.com. Several sections of this paper reflect the author's experience in the
fields of transport economics, transport deregulation, and the management of large transport
networks. The author has no financial links with any urban car service industry competitors,
investors or regulators, or with any firms that work on behalf of those industry participants.
Special thanks to Yves Smith and Lambert Strether of the financial blog Naked Capitalism and
to Izabella Kaminska of the Financial Times for valuable comments on earlier drafts.
     1. For current information on Uber's financing rounds, see https://www.crunchbase.com/
organization/uber#/entity. In 2016, Uber had four times the value of the second highest valued
US based startup (Airbnb) and Uber's valuation exceeded the equity value of 85% of the S&P
500. Alex Barinka et al., Uber Backers Said to Push for Didi Truce in Costly China War, BLoom-
BERG (July 20, 2016, 1:13 PM), http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-07-20/uber-inves-
tors-said-to-push-for-didi-truce-in-costly-china-fight.
    2. These investors include Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, Google Ventures, Benchmark,
TPG, Goldman  Sachs, Menlo Ventures, Alfred Lin of Sequoia Capital, Kleiner Perkins Caufield
Byers, Lowercase Capital and Summit Partners. Almost all private equity investments since mid-


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