With the Uber app you can have food delivered, order transport and much more – everything revolves around the topic of mobility. TECHBOOK spoke to the head of Germany at Uber about the company’s business model and its vision for the future.
In the USA, the Uber offer took off right away. In Germany, on the other hand, the start in 2014 was somewhat bumpy. In the meantime, however, the service has also established itself in this country. With “Uber Eats” and “Uber Direct”, the functionality was also successively expanded. TECHBOOK has with the Uber boss Germany, Christoph Weigler, spoke in an interview about the new offers, but also about his vision for the mobility world of the future and the security of such concepts. With our colleagues from TRAVELBOOK you can also read, among other things, what changes Uber has brought about in the travel industry and how sustainable the company actually is.
Interview with Christoph Weigler from Uber
TECHBOOK: The issue of safety is essential in the industry. When tracking in the Uber app, you can already release your location and share it with certain people. Are there any other thoughts on how to make driving even safer, especially for vulnerable target groups?
Christoph Weigler: A lot happens behind the scenes. For example, there is facial recognition software that the app uses to check whether the right driver is actually in the vehicle. For example, it can be ruled out that someone else is driving who is not authorized to do so. And then there are other features: Not only can you easily share the route yourself, but the Uber app also recognizes irregularities. If, for example, the journey ends abruptly or the car stays in one place for an unusually long time, the app automatically recognizes this and we would contact the passenger and the driver.
And on the other hand: how do you protect female drivers?
The safety of female drivers is very important to us. In some markets, for example, female drivers already have the option of specifying that they only wish to be placed with female passengers.
Would it also be conceivable in the other direction that female passengers would then specifically look for female drivers?
That is absolutely obvious and also a good idea. Unfortunately, there are still too few female drivers in many countries. That’s because it’s a very male-dominated industry, where women have traditionally been underrepresented. But we want to change this and bring the topic closer to women, for example with events.
New Uber features in the app
Uber has publicly set itself the goal of being emission-free by 2030. For this purpose, the app is now also connected to public transport in some cities. But how does the “Uber Eats” offer, with which you can have food delivered to you by restaurants, fit into this innovation expansion concept?
This is definitely a very exciting area for us. “Uber Eats” started in Germany in May 2021. The platform is now available in more than 70 cities, with plans to increase to 100 by the end of the year. 6000 restaurants have food delivered via our platform. In my opinion, Germany is doing well in the field of food delivery that there is more competition. Until recently, there was actually only one provider. In addition, it was previously the case that local favorite restaurants were hardly represented due to the lack of their own delivery staff. We work with logistic companies that do the delivery for these restaurants. This helps a lot to increase the choice of restaurants for the users.
There is now another service here in Germany called “Uber Direct”.
Uber Direct” takes this concept one step further and is aimed at business customers. The retailers can use the existing delivery infrastructure of Uber Eats and offer customers a delivery within half an hour via their websites and apps without setting up a delivery service themselves.
How has this offer been received so far?
We are very satisfied with the development of “Uber Eats”. We’ve only just gotten started with Uber Direct and it’s too early to say for sure. But we see abroad that this service has huge potential because many local retailers have been left behind because they don’t offer delivery. Uber tries to support them with “Uber Direct”.
Then: Are there any technical new features planned for the near future? Should the app be expanded further?
Yes, in any case. We want to further improve what already exists, even if this is less visible to users at first glance. An example is the so-called “Forward Dispatch”. This means that the driver, depending on his location, gets the next passenger from his company while he is still on a trip.
Are there any innovations that are already visible to customers?
Yes, for example the pre-order function “Uber Reserve”, which we recently launched in Germany as well. There was a lot of demand for this, especially from business customers. If I have to get to the airport at 4 a.m., I can use the Uber app to book a ride at that time, but the wait might be longer. The pre-order gives me the security that a vehicle will be at my door on time.
The future of Uber and the mobility industry
How does Uber envision the digital mobility world of the future and what role does Uber play in it?
The mobility of the future is definitely electric. By 2025, the majority of our partners’ fleets should be electrified. Also shared. In concrete terms, this means that it is no longer used by just one person, but that it is solved in a smarter way and the utilization is increased. And of course autonomous.
Autonomous Driving: Threat or Opportunity?
It will still be a while before a large proportion of cars are autonomous. That is why there will be a very large proportion of human drivers on the platform for the foreseeable future. But for certain driving profiles we will be able to mix in autonomous fleets. An example: A route within the city that is equipped with good map material, that does not contain any complex intersections or the like, can be supplied autonomously in a timely manner. But if I want to drive from Berlin to Sylt, for example, it will probably take a while before it works autonomously.
In this respect, we see a huge advantage in the fact that we already cooperate with many rental car companies and have a platform with 130 million monthly users worldwide. I also believe that autonomous driving will massively increase safety in the future. And it could also make rides more affordable in some countries.
How optimistic are you regarding these specific scenarios for Germany?
I am optimistic, because the German economy is a leader in the fields of optics and sensor technology, and Germany will also be able to make an important contribution to the development of autonomous vehicles. Other countries, such as the USA, are more progressive in terms of regulation, but I think that we will find a good framework here too. Unfortunately, it seems clear that the algorithms for autonomous driving are not written in Germany. A uniform European regulation would help a lot here.