Gadgets
Uber Reports Widening Loss on Driver Incentives, Pandemic Impact
Investors sold the shares despite Uber management’s assurances that the company can deliver a sharp turnaround in profitability even as New York and other major cities reimpose some pandemic restrictions.
Uber posted an adjusted $509 million (roughly Rs. 3,780 crores) second-quarter loss before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation – a metric that excludes one-time costs, including stock-based compensation – widening losses by nearly $150 million (roughly Rs. 1,110 crores) from the first quarter.
Analysts on average had expected the company to report an adjusted EBITDA loss of around $324.5 million (roughly Rs. 2,410 crores), Refinitiv data showed.
Shares were down 5 percent in after-hours trading after closing the regular session down 2.2 percent.
The company also warned investors that uncertainty from the Delta variant of the coronavirus continues to impact visibility into recovery.
But Uber Chief Executive Dara Khosrowshahi told analysts on a conference call that the company’s food delivery business provided a hedge against potential ride-hail declines and that July trends support the company’s confidence for the second half of the year.
Gross bookings during the second quarter reached an all-time high of nearly $22 billion (roughly Rs. 1,63,350 crores), with more passengers returning for trips while food delivery orders also increased.
Nevertheless, the earnings call was dominated by questions over driver supply and the ongoing impact of the pandemic.
Investors are worried about the ongoing shortage of drivers in the industry as demand ramps up. Uber’s smaller rival, Lyft, on Tuesday said it expected limited driver supply to continue in the next quarter, requiring further investments in driver incentives.
Uber said riders returned to its platform in greater numbers in July and it expects the trend to continue in the coming months, together with strong food delivery orders.
Uber reaffirmed its goal of hitting profitability on an adjusted EBITDA basis at the end of this year and said it would reduce losses to $100 million (roughly Rs. 740 crores) in the third quarter.
That assumes the more contagious Delta variant does not reverse a gradual reopening of the US economy, an issue that Lyft said on Tuesday it was monitoring.
Uber on Wednesday said monthly active drivers and food delivery workers had increased by nearly 420,000 from February to July. Passenger wait times in major US cities also decreased during that time, the company said.
Uber spent a massive $250 million (roughly Rs. 1,860 crores) in driver incentive investment in the second quarter, which increased losses at its ride-hail business. Uber said mobility profitability will expand significantly as US and Canadian driver investments fade, a trend it has witnessed in Australia and other markets.
US driver supply increased by 30 percent from June to July, even as incentives were reduced.
“We invested early and aggressively and are seeing very positive momentum,” Khosrowshahi said.
The company had urged US drivers to take advantage of the incentives before pay drops to pre-COVID-19 levels as more drivers return to the platform.
Total costs and expenses in the second quarter jumped by over 57 percent to $5.12 billion (roughly Rs. 38,020 crores) year over year.
Uber also took advantage of unrealised gains in its investments in Chinese ride-hail company Didi Global and self-driving company Aurora to post second-quarter net profit of $1.1 billion (roughly Rs. 8,170 crores).
Uber executives said the company might sell some of those positions after clearing regulatory restrictions if the market offered reasonable values for them.
Uber’s delivery unit, which includes restaurant delivery service Uber Eats, narrowed losses on a quarterly basis and more than doubled gross bookings from last year.
Overall, the company reported second-quarter revenue of $3.9 billion (roughly Rs. 28,950 crores), beating average analyst estimates of $3.75 billion (roughly Rs. 27,840 crores), according to IBES data from Refinitiv.
Uber doubled down on Uber Eats, which has been a pandemic winner, by acquiring rival startup Postmates and last-mile alcohol delivery company Drizly.
Uber is also expanding its grocery delivery business, having announced partnerships with Albertsons Companies and Costco Wholesale.
In July, Uber also announced the acquisition of logistics company Transplace for about $2.25 billion (roughly Rs. 16,700 crores) in a boon to its freight delivery unit, which is now expected to break even on an adjusted EBITDA basis by the end of 2022.
© Thomson Reuters 2021
“At Xbox, we believe that with better tools, creators can make even more extraordinary games,” Haiyan Zhang, GM, Xbox Gaming AI, said in a blog post. “This partnership will bring together: Inworld’s expertise in working with generative AI models for character development, Microsoft’s cutting-edge cloud-based AI solutions including Azure OpenAI Service, Microsoft Research’s technical insights into the future of play, and Team Xbox’s strengths in revolutionizing accessible and responsible creator tools for all developers.”
The aforementioned AI design copilot is a toolset that will help game designers turn prompts into scripts and dialogue trees. In contrast, the character runtime will enable dynamically generated plot beats and quests. We’ve already seen heavy AI integration in games by way of procedural generation — a more recent example being the 1000+ planets in Starfield. Not to mention, enemy AI has been around for way longer.
Inworld made headlines in August when it launched a modded story mode for Grand Theft Auto V, Sentient Streets, in which players had to investigate the rise of a bizarre AI-worshipping cult — a segment loaded with characters that spoke in AI-generated dialogue, on the fly. The mod was later taken down by publisher Take-Two, leaving a permanent strike on the creator Bloc’s YouTube channel. As per The Verge, Inworld’s AI technology can also be used for narration in top-down RPGs to warn players about any events awaiting off-screen and respond to questions like we’ve seen in the past year with AI chatbots like ChatGPT and Bing Chat. Microsoft has also been heavily banking on artificial intelligence, having made a $10 billion (about Rs. 83,254 crore) investment in OpenAI. The company has also integrated AI tools into its popular suite of services and also added an AI copilot to Windows.
Despite being a Microsoft-affiliated AI toolset, it would be interesting to see whether titles using them will be allowed to thrive on other platforms. In July, Valve claimed that it would be cracking down on games that included AI-generated assets if the developer didn’t own the copyright to the piece of art. For the uninitiated, when you insert a prompt to create something in AI, the software simply repurposes existing assets found online and mushes them together — basically stealing from other artists and writers without appropriate commercial licenses. Infringing them would lead to the game not being distributed on Steam, forcing the developers to seek proper licenses for the asset by reaching out to the AI companies involved. It’s unclear how Microsoft’s partnership will play out — as long as AI content is being used as a catalyst to innovate and create something new, it should be fine.
In a post on X shared by BSNL’s Andhra Pradesh (@bsnl_ap_circle) unit, the company confirmed that BSNL users can upgrade their older 2G or 3G SIMs to a 4G SIM for free. Not only will the upgrade be free, but a promotional image shared with the post suggests that users who opt for the upgrade will also receive 4GB of free data that will be valid for three months. It is speculated that BSNL is aiming to boost its upcoming 4G services with this offer. The announcement was first spotted by Telecom Talk.
To access the free data offer and the free upgrade, BSNL users are requested to get in touch with executives at BSNL’s Customer Service Centre, franchisee or retailer stores, or contact one of their Direct Selling Agents (DSA). The promo image also adds in a finer print that the offer is available with certain terms and conditions, but hasn’t detailed any, so far.
Reliance’s Jio recently launched the 4G-supported Bharat B1 feature phone in India. The handset is priced at Rs. 1,299 in India. Alongside 4G connectivity, the phone comes with JioCinema and JioSaavn applications pre-installed.
The Jio Bharat B1 is equipped with the JioPay application, which is said to allow users to make UPI payments. Aiming to increase accessibility, the phone supports 23 languages overall, including multiple regional languages.
Realme, via Weibo, announced the arrival of the Realme GT 5 Pro in China. The display of the handset is confirmed to offer 3000 nits peak brightness. It has also been teased to offer heat dissipation with a surface area of around 10,000mm2. It is confirmed to ship with Qualcomm’s new Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 SoC. The post doesn’t specify the exact launch date of the smartphone, however, given the release of the teasers, the launch could be just around the corner.
The Realme GT 5 Pro has been in the news a lot lately. It is expected to feature a 6.78-inch (1,264×2,780 pixels) AMOLED display and is tipped to come in 8GB, 12GB, and 16GB RAM options along with 128GB, 256GB, 512GB, and 1TB inbuilt storage options.
For optics, the Realme GT 5 Pro is said to have a triple rear camera unit comprising two 50-megapixel sensors and an 8-megapixel shooter at the rear. The camera setup might include a Sony LYTIA LYT808 sensor, an OmniVision OV08D10 secondary sensor, and a Sony IMX890 telephoto sensor. For selfies, there could be a 32-megapixel sensor at the front. It is said to carry a 5,400mAh battery with support for 100W wired charging and 50W wireless charging.
The Realme GT 5 Pro is expected to come with upgrades over Realme GT 5. The latter was launched in China in August with a price tag of CNY 2,999 for the base model with 12GB of RAM and 256GB of storage.
-
Solar Energy3 years agoDLR testing the use of molten salt in a solar power plant in Portugal
-
Camera1 year agoDJI Air 3 vs. Mini 4 Pro: which compact drone is best?
-
world news1 year ago
Gulf, France aid Gaza, Russia evacuates citizens
-
Camera1 year agoSony a9 III: what you need to know
-
world news1 year ago
Strong majority of Americans support Israel-Hamas hostage deal
-
Indian Defense3 years ago
Israeli Radar Company Signs MoU To Cooperate With India’s Alpha Design Technologies
-
Camera4 years agoCharles ‘Chuck’ Geschke, co-founder of Adobe and inventor of the PDF, dies at 81
-
Solar Energy1 year agoGlencore eyes options on battery recycling project
