<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-topline"><a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/siladityaray/2024/08/26/uber-fined-record-324-million-in-netherlands-for-transferring-sensitive-eu-driver-data-to-us/#open-web-0"></a><a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/siladityaray/2024/08/26/uber-fined-record-324-million-in-netherlands-for-transferring-sensitive-eu-driver-data-to-us/#open-web-0"></a>Topline</h2>



Dutch privacy regulators hit Uber with a record $324 million (€290 million) fine Monday for violating the European Union’s data protection laws by transferring sensitive personal data of its drivers to the U.S. without adequate safeguards.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-facts">Key Facts</h2>



The Dutch Data Protection Authority said its investigation found Uber had transferred the personal data of European cab drivers—including taxi licenses, IDs, location data, photos, payment details, and “in some cases even criminal and medical records,” to the U.S.



The agency said Uber transferred this data to the U.S. for over two years without proper transfer tools designed to protect user privacy—in violation of the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).



Uber ended this violation and has implemented the proper safeguards since late last year, the Dutch DPA said.



According to&nbsp;<a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-08-26/uber-hit-by-record-324-million-fine-for-data-transfers-to-us?utm_source=twitter&amp;cmpid=socialflow-twitter-business&amp;utm_content=business&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_campaign=socialflow-organic&amp;embedded-checkout=true" rel="noreferrer noopener" target="_blank">Bloomberg</a>, the $324 million penalty is the biggest issued by the Dutch DPA and the biggest fine Uber has faced globally.



Forbes has reached out to Uber for comment, but the company told Bloomberg the fine is “completely unjustified,” claiming it was compliant with the laws and will file an appeal.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-crucial-quote">Crucial Quote</h2>



“In Europe, the GDPR protects people&#8217;s fundamental rights by requiring companies and governments to handle personal data with care. But outside Europe, this is unfortunately not the case…This is why companies are usually obliged to take extra measures if they store personal data of Europeans outside the European Union,” Dutch DPA Chair Aleid Wolfsen said, adding Uber’s violation was “very serious.”



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-background">Key Background</h2>



Earlier this year, the Dutch DPA&nbsp;<a href="https://www.reuters.com/technology/dutch-watchdog-fines-uber-10-mln-euros-over-privacy-regulations-infringement-2024-01-31/" rel="noreferrer noopener" target="_blank">fined</a>&nbsp;Uber $11 million (€10 million) for how it handled the retention of drivers’ personal data. The agency found Uber had not properly laid out terms and conditions for how long it retains driver personal data. The DPA also found Uber’s process for allowing drivers to make personal data access requests “unnecessarily complicated.” Both the previous fine and the latest one stem from an investigation launched by the Dutch agency in response to a complaint filed by 170 French drivers with the country’s privacy regulator. The investigation was handed over to the Dutch DPA, since Uber’s EU operations are headquartered in the Netherlands. Under the EU’s GDPR laws, violating companies can be fined up to 4% of their annual global revenue.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-further-reading">Further Reading</h2>



<a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-08-26/uber-hit-by-record-324-million-fine-for-data-transfers-to-us" rel="noreferrer noopener" target="_blank">Uber Hit by Record $324 Million Fine for Data Transfers to US</a>&nbsp;(Bloomberg)

Uber Headquarters Ahead Of Earnings Figures

Uber Fined Record $324 Million In Netherlands For Transferring Sensitive EU Driver Data To U.S.

<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-topline">TOPLINE</h2>



The lawsuit against Uber comes a month after Uber released a US Safety report revealing nearly 1,000 sexual assault incidents.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">KEY FACTS</h2>



The complaint, filed Wednesday in San Francisco, claims that Uber has known since 2014 that drivers have sexually assaulted and raped female customers, but has “prioritized growth over customer service,” according to a statement from attorneys Slater Slater Schulman who are representing the alleged victims.&nbsp;



In June, Uber published its second <a href="https://www.uber.com/newsroom/2022-us-safety-report/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">US Safety Report</a> showing that nearly 1,000 passengers were sexually assaulted in 2020 by app drivers across the US.



The statement from the attorneys alleges that women have been “kidnapped, sexually assaulted, sexually battered, raped, falsely imprisoned, stalked, harrassed,” by Uber drivers they were matched to in the app.



Adam Slater, founding partner at the firm, said more can be done to protect passengers, including adding cameras to deter assaults, performing more background checks on drivers and a warning system that alerts when drivers change destination.



Uber declined to comment.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">KEY BACKGROUND</h2>



Uber is now <a href="https://www.forbes.com/companies/uber/?sh=1be29c0010b0">valued</a> at a $42.36 billion market cap. Founded in San Francisco in 2009, Uber has a history of impressive growth, but also controversy. Starting as a car service, the company later expanded to other services like UberPool (multiple parties in a ride), UberEats (delivery food from different restaurants) and it became a publicly traded company. The company has been surrounded by a series of scandals – including allegations of a sexist <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/alanohnsman/2017/06/21/ubers-travis-kalanick-said-to-resign-as-ceo-amid-investor-backlash/?sh=10ba353743c8">work culture</a>, lack of safety measures for passengers and failure to comply with a <a href="https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/story/2021-12-02/uber-9-million-california-settlement-regulators-sexual-assault-data" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">request</a> from California regulators for information on sexual assault claims. In 2018 Uber introduced a new technology to monitor US drivers for new criminal offenses and background checks, resulting in 80,000 drivers being<a href="https://uber.app.box.com/s/vkx4zgwy6sxx2t2618520xt35rix022h?uclick_id=6324d6d0-ac5c-4ab9-a137-d08cba8e01c4" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener"> removed</a> from the app till this date. Some other <a href="https://businesses.uber.com/rs/613-QPH-162/images/UberforBusiness_SafetyGuide_US.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">safety measures</a> include GPS tracked trips, the option to share your ride with other contacts and a 911 assistance emergency button in the Uber app.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">CONTRA</h2>



Uber said that sexual assault claims&nbsp;<a href="https://www.uber.com/newsroom/2022-us-safety-report/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">decreased</a>&nbsp;by 38% from its first report from 2017 to 2018, but data remains unclear since it corresponds to 2020 during COVID-19, when Uber reported a decrease by 80% of drives.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">FURTHER READING</h2>



<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/carlieporterfield/2022/07/10/uber-courted-politicians-to-help-it-expand-worldwide-despite-other-than-legal-status-leaked-docs-reportedly-show/?sh=1c7b697c1917">Uber Courted Politicians To Help It Expand Worldwide Despite ‘Other Than Legal’ Status, Leaked Docs Reportedly Show</a> (Forbes)



By Gabriela Lopez Gomes, Forbes Staff

Young woman ordering a taxi ride with mobile app on smart phone

Over 500 Female Passengers Sue Uber Over Sexual Assault Complaints

With Airbnb filing paperwork for an initial public offering last week, it became the latest of many companies to pursue a confidential IPO, which experts say allows for more flexibility and can be more advantageous than the traditional route of filing an S-1 months ahead of time.



KEY FACTS



The confidential IPO can&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wyattresearch.com/article/confidential-ipos/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">trace its origins</a>&nbsp;back to President Barack Obama’s 2012 JOBS Act, which allowed companies with less than $1 billion in annual revenue to file S-1 IPO paperwork confidentially.



In June 2017, that $1 billion cap was lifted,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2017/06/30/sec-allow-confidential-ipo-registration-filings/442539001/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">allowing all companies</a>&nbsp;to leverage the confidential IPO when attempting to go public, which proved to be a very popular option in the following years.



Companies like Uber and Lyft are the “two posterchildren for using this strategy,” as well as others like Spotify, Slack and Palantir, says Sandeep Dahiya, associate professor of entrepreneurship at Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business.



“The biggest advantage of confidential filings is withholding information from competitors for a few months, compared to a traditional filing that everyone could see,” explains Jay Ritter, a finance professor at the University of Florida who is known as “Mr. IPO” for his work on initial public offerings.



“The flexibility of timing and price range fluidity is a huge part of it—and even more so given the underlying volatility in the stock market today,” says Dayiha.&nbsp;



“Think of it as playing poker with the market: If companies pursue a traditional IPO, the market can deal them a very different hand in the 90 to 120 days leading up to when they’re scheduled to go public,” he adds.



If a company does decide to go ahead with an IPO after a confidential filing, they are required to file a public S-1 form just three weeks beforehand (rather than months ahead), but that still gives investors more than enough time to evaluate financials, says Ritter.



CRUCIAL QUOTE



“With a traditional IPO, once you file paperwork and the train has left the station, it’s hard to stop it,” says Dahiya. “That’s the beauty of a confidential IPO—there’s no set date and more flexibility.”



BIG NUMBER



So far this year, the average first day return for an IPO is 36%—the highest level since 2000, according to Ritter. “We’re on pace for not only the highest average first day return but also more doubling in price of any year since 1999 and 2000,” he adds.



WHAT TO WATCH FOR



Home sharing giant Airbnb is one of the most recent&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/sergeiklebnikov/2020/08/19/airbnb-confidentially-files-ipo-paperwork/">high-profile examples</a>&nbsp;of a company pursuing the confidential filing route. By doing so, the company did not have to disclose any financial information or specify how many shares would be offered in its IPO—giving it far more flexibility than in a traditional S-1 filing. “Covid-19 was just brutal for the hospitality industry, so the fact that Airbnb feels like it can have decent enough performance I think is very encouraging,” says Dahiya. Meanwhile, it has also been&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/07/22/bill-ackman-and-tontine-holdings-rewrite-the-terms-for-spacs.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">widely reported</a>&nbsp;that Airbnb might be in talks with billionaire investor Bill Ackman’s special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC) about a possible reverse merger. “That’s certainly a plausible scenario,” says Ritter, adding, “it makes sense for Airbnb to pursue a dual track strategy to improve their bargaining position both with Ackman and with Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley (the underwriters for its IPO) to play them off each other.”



KEY BACKGROUND



While IPOs were at a virtual standstill for much of the first half of 2020 because of the coronavirus pandemic, Airbnb is the latest to join a rush of companies going public amid the stock market’s rebound from its coronavirus recession low point in March. Among those who have successfully done so are music label Warner Music Group and insurtech startup Lemonade.



FURTHER READING



<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/sergeiklebnikov/2020/08/19/airbnb-confidentially-files-ipo-paperwork/">Airbnb Confidentially Files IPO Paperwork</a> (Forbes)



-Sergei Klebnikov,Forbes Staff

D1AETISPVAAA

Here’s Why More Companies Are Filing Confidential IPO Paperwork

The nature of permanent employment is changing, revolutionized by technology. Is the gig economy here to stay?



<hr class="wp-block-separator"/>



In the suburb of Randburg in South Africa, 25-year-old media entrepreneur Zola Brunner is determined to succeed as her own boss. She works as a ‘full-time’ freelancer. 



The gig economy is an option she deliberately considered, like many&nbsp; millennials like her. 



“I didn’t intend to come into it. It just so happened that I was working at a news organization. I put in all my hours and dedicated my time. You push and push, but it got to a point where I wanted to also do more because I don’t like to stick to one thing or one job,” she says.



While working on a television show for her former employer, she was creating content for two other companies on the side. 



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">“I was able to substitute that income where I was working and focus on the other jobs that I was doing.” </blockquote>



She cites flexibility as a major reason for venturing into freelance work. “It gives me more space and time to manage who I want to work with and what specific project I want to work on. You can also set your time and set your rate. So, for me, it fits into my lifestyle.”



&nbsp;In 2018, Brunner founded Beyond Media for two reasons. One of them was quite unexpected. 



“I was working three, four jobs at the time, with different clients, and these clients came from referrals, people requesting and requiring video content for their platforms to disseminate onto social media. These clients wanted to market their product, their organization, and just boost their social media platforms. I was able to assist them with this. 



“At that point, I realized there is a set number of referrals I’m getting that need this content, then surely, I’ll be able to do this on a permanent basis because it was getting out of hand. I was getting to a point where I had to make a decision; where I was going to focus on juggling a number of clients or one specific job. I took the first option.”



Brunner says the second reason was the realization that there’s a technology gap and mobile phones are at the forefront. She uses her mobile phone to film and create content for her clients. “My most memorable experience was when I delivered the final product to a satisfied client who was happy. From there, it led to more work, and I realized that I could do it, and I’ll be okay. I’m happy with my decision.”



While Brunner cherishes certain moments as a freelancer, she does face challenges. “Not knowing when to stop because, as an entity, you don’t necessarily have an accounts department, you don’t have a graphics team,you don’t have an HR manager, you become all of that. So, for me, the challenge is when do I stop? You get into a space where you do everything and there is no time clock, there is no 9-to-5. You work on the times when you need to deliver a project. That was problematic because it had an impact on my health. I had to resolve it by taking some time out and working on my time management and my health.”



Brunner sees a future for the gig economy. “The future of work is having the freedom to choose to work remotely or collaborate. It is the freedom to push boundaries and embrace new technologies because it’s ok. It’s how you are going to evolve and stay ahead of your competitors in order to be a success. It is also the freedom to disrupt the system.” 



With one powerful brush in her hand, makeup artist Deogracious Dube, 27, works on the faces of clients. Besides referrals, she aggressively uses social media to acquire customers. 



Dube previously worked as a makeup artist in a retail store.“I am largely in control of my own time. When I worked for MAC, I had certain hours to keep. I had to plan my life around those hours. As a freelancer, you can schedule how you work. You have time to actually do other things. I didn’t want to be on my feet eight hours a day. I have dreams and plans of starting my own business one day, my own makeup line, or opening my own salon, things like that.”



She speaks about the future of makeup artistry in the gig economy. “Makeup artists used to be in the background but the field is growing and becoming more glamorized and popular, and as a result, more people know about it and we have become more in demand.”



Uber is one of the major players in the gig economy. Their drivers, who are location-based freelancers, get paid for each ‘gig’. One hot Saturday afternoon, as people make their way in and out of a mall in the East Rand outside Johannesburg, Uber driver Donald Beukes waits in his car for his next customer, his eyes fixed on his phone.



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">“Being unemployed, I couldn’t find a job. I decided to join the Uber team because this was the only place I could actually get a job.” </blockquote>



When asked if he would ever consider returning to a nine-to-five job, he says: “No! I am my own boss. I determine how long I want to work. It actually builds your character. You push yourself if you work for Uber because you want to reach a certain target of money. If you reach your target, you’ll be able to make a living … Depending how much I push myself, I can make roughly R15,000 ($1,040) after paying everything.” 



As South Africa is gripped by recession, pay hikes are hard to come by, and food and fuel costs are escalating. Therefore, having a ‘gig’or ‘side hustle’ has become critical for some people. 



With the unemployment rate currently at 27.5% and the youth unemployment rate at 52.8%, some respondents we dealt with for this story have come to the realization that dependency on a government dealing with internal issues such as corruption, is no longer an option. This could be one of the many reasons why the gig economy is on the ascent in South Africa. 



There is an increase in freelance work as more people opt for self-employment. Work in the gig economy can be web-based (you could work from anywhere) or location-based. Both provide flexible hours and a sense of freedom compared to a traditional job. 



According to the Regus Exclusive Economic Survey, “A rise inflexible working also benefits individuals, set to save people 3.53 billion hours of commuting time by 2030. A predicted boom in flexible working could contribute $10.04 trillion to the global economy by 2030”. 



Nesan Nair, senior portfolio manager at Sasfin Securities,says the number of platforms for freelancers to get their work to a larger audience are more accessible now, compared to 20 years ago. 



“How many people have set up YouTube channels to do basic things? Baking a cake, for example, then they get people to subscribe and then they can sell advertising on that channel. It’s not a question of standing on a street corner and getting 1,000 people to come and view your product. 



“We’re talking about millions and billions of people that can access what you have to say in a cheap and efficient manner. Look at Facebook users, for example; close to two billion people access the platform. If you can get your work on there and get a small percentage of people that understand what you’re doing, and if you’ve got a value proposition that makes sense and people are interested in, you can have a very successful launch in a matter of weeks.” 



But while the benefits of the gig economy include freedom and flexibility, there’s a major downside to it, lack of security one of them.



“I know if I want to get a home loan, it’s going to be a little bit tricky because I don’t have a permanent job,” says Brunner.



“I don’t have fears when I reach my pension because I am putting aside money. It’s obviously not the same compared to a company that puts the money aside for you and you can’t touch it until you retire or until you leave,” says Dube. 



The Fourth Industrial Revolution could disrupt the job market as technology threatens to replace a number of traditional jobs. There’s an alarming rate of retrenchments and job cuts in the formal sector and people may be forced to enter the gig economy.



According to Statistics South Africa, businesses in the country currently use 14% of total spend on their employees. These employment costs consist of salaries and wages, bonuses, pension, benefits, life insurance benefits, medical aid, and other employee-related costs. Businesses looking to offer freelance positions to lower company costs will mean more people will have the opportunity to take on more than one job at a time. 



“A lot of people will start working for themselves. At the moment, we’ve got women drivers who are driving for themselves. It just shows that it’s not a male-dominated business, women are also coming in.,” says Beukes. 



“A lot of people are realizing the economy is so unstable,and you can’t really rely on a job. People are getting retrenched, the world is changing, and traditional jobs are not what they were, say 10 years ago. You can’t rely on one salary as much as you think you can. 



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">New jobs are also being created these days which were not around, say, even as little as five years ago. The job market is changing. </blockquote>



“A lot of people are really talented. They’ve got so many talents. You can be an accountant but you’re talented at organizing things or planning events, so you do events management on the weekend, or plan parties&#8230; There’s more to life than just one job. We’re all very multi-dimensional,” says Dube. 



Nadir Thokan, an investment analyst for 27Four, says that ultimately it’s about productivity. “If people can be more productive freelancing, then that’s the way we’re going to be migrating towards. If we’re more productive by being a contractual employee, then that’s what you’re going to do. It also speaks on people’s risk appetite. 



“Ultimately, you have to have a higher risk appetite in order to be a freelancer because you don’t have the stability of a monthly cheque, but it can be more financially rewarding over the long-term if you become very good at freelancing because your time becomes your own and you can work for multiple sources and that can be financially rewarding for you.” 



Is the gig economy here to stay? “In the space where it can create employment, I think it will definitely disrupt the South African industry and it’s definitely here to stay, for example, the way Uber has revolutionized how people travel in South Africa has been phenomenal. The reality of the matter is that it is more cost-effective than a normal taxi(metered cab) and it’s creating employment, so those kinds of disruptions that are positive, and make people’s lives easier are here to stay. 



In addition to growing the economy and improving the absorption rate into the formal sector,maybe we’ve got to rethink the way we create employment. Freelancing could definitely be one way we could reduce the number of unemployed people over time,” says Thokan. 



Adds Nair: “Younger people, because of their nature, are more adventurous. They don’t buy cars, they Uber. They don’t buy houses, they Airbnb. It’s almost a different mind-set that they have in life. They don’t want to acquire assets, they want to acquire experiences… Younger people want to explore their own ideas, their own ambitions and the technological environment right now affords them that opportunity more than any point in history we’ve seen before.”



The only option then for Africa Inc. may be to consider changing mind-sets and redraft the employment rule book.

Capture1

Popularity Of Freelancing Has Changed The 9-to-5 Landscape

Godwin Gabriel has always had the gift of the gab. At 17, he closed the biggest deal in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, supplying food and beverages to a five-star luxury hotel overlooking the picturesque Indian Ocean.
As he recalls, it all happened in a flash: one minute he was a youngster looking for extra income and the next, he was sat across a table, suited and booted, having lunch with the food and beverages manager of the hotel and her team with only $55 in his pocket.
“I was scared I could not afford the bill. When the bill came, it was literally 55bucks. I remember sweating and I was literally getting ready to prepare to wash dishes, but it all worked out in the end and I got the deal,” he says of that meeting.
Then came the hard part. With no money to pay suppliers, Gabriel had to rely on his gab yet again to get the trust of suppliers to deliver on credit. His natural flair for business made his parents uneasy; fearing he would not return to school, they shipped him off to the United States (US) in an attempt to get him back to his books, but it was too late: Gabriel had already caught the entrepreneurial bug.
For the next three decades, that gift of the gab combined with grit, self-confidence, and perseverance would serve Gabriel well, driving him beyond personal and professional setbacks to create a business that would compete with giants like Uber and Lyft.
Gabriel is the founder of Moovn, an app that seeks to capture a piece of the billion-dollar ride-sharing market and that he hopes will eventually dethrone Uber, which, over the past few years, has experienced significant challenges. The company suffered several scandals and allegations which led to the #deleteuber campaign and the resignation of CEO Travis Kalanick. In South Africa, Uber drivers have had several clashes with taxi drivers, some deadly, prompting the company to hire private security forces to protect them.
Despite these woes, Uber still has an imposing 74% of the ride-sharing market with operations in over 633 countries and a valuation of $72 billion. Regardless, Gabriel remains unperturbed.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/30-under-30/2017/11/07/top-african-tech-startups-need-know/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: These Are The Top African Tech Startups You Need To Know About</a>
“We are in our own lane, and before the end of the year, we will be a complete threat to them. They are studying us, and they know who we are. We know this because in the search words or key words on Google, when someone types in Moovn, you get an Uber or Lyft ad and it is something that is in their metadata. So they must have put our company’s name in their metadata,” says Gabriel.
He believes the key to any ride-sharing service’s success is taking care of its drivers. To avoid the mistakes made by other ride-sharing apps, he has redesigned his app’s user experience to empathize with the driver, a trick he learned in his early days in the hospitality business.
Gabriel’s journey has been a natural evolution marred by a series of ill-timed events. Like the time he came close to fulfilling his childhood dream.
“When I was younger I dreamed of being a pilot; I was actually hired by American Airlines to become a junior in their flight-training program. Everything was lined up to make that dream happen but just before I reported to the job, 9/11 happened and that was a wrap. I went back into a different industry and never returned.”
Then there was the time he was working as an asset manager. Gabriel had spent a significant amount of time building his expertise in the hospitality industry, acquiring an enviable clientele that included Marriott and Starwood hotels. But just when it seemed like the world was Gabriel’s oyster, disaster struck.
“It was a very strong area for me, but it wasn’t until 2010 when the aftermath of the economic recession was really felt and a lot of these real estate portfolios went belly-up. It was a really tumultuous time in terms of most industries and I found myself constantly working long hours and getting burned out. So, by the time the last assets were taken off my hands, I wanted to change my career,” says Gabriel.
The US subprime mortgage crisis that sparked a nationwide banking emergency left most of Gabriel’s portfolios in receivership. Portfolios previously worth billions of dollars were now being sold for about $100 million, and with that, it was time for Gabriel to yet again look for a new industry and start all over again. But luckily, he had stumbled on an idea to provide a cab service to the guests of the hotels he managed.
“Back in 2006, I started a luxury car hire business with a chauffeur in Seattle for business executives, because I had already made access to these hotels. It was a little side hustle that turned into a big deal. I went from a couple of cars to 15 to 20 cars, and I had to outsource a large volume of demand to independent operators.”
“It was one of those things that I was always interested in, so when Uber came, and they were doing what we did back in the day with technology, I said to my partner what if we had that technology when we were doing our business back then?”
For Gabriel, an MBA from the University of Washington’s Foster School of Business would prove instrumental in helping him to spot the potential of technology.
“Towards the end of my course, we did a consulting bid for Microsoft for an education software for two of the largest economies in the world, India and China, and I led that project. I was exposed to technology and I thought this was amazing. I had no tech background and never worked for a tech company before. I was just amazed at the margins and I thought this is the industry for me,” says Gabriel.
And that was how he began to look for opportunities in the tech space. He initially approached several developers to build an app for him, but getting people to buy into his vision proved difficult. So instead of giving up, he decided to build it himself. Hours of YouTube videos and discussions in chatrooms later, Gabriel developed a working prototype which he used to test the viability of his idea.
“We had the clientele; we had the relationships; and we had the drivers and so I sent out a little survey to some of them and the clients I had and asked ‘what if I created something like this, would you be interested?’ The response was overwhelming. At around the same time, It was also at the time that some of the drivers were complaining about being mistreated by some of these larger platforms, about not being able to earn a decent living and working long hours.”
That was when Gabriel decided that he would go the B2B route instead of chasing the consumer market that Uber was already dominant in. In addition to being the mastermind behind Moovn as well as its chief executive, Gabriel sees himself as an activist fighting to give the forgotten driver a voice.
Moovn differentiates itself by taking a 15% commission per ride instead of the 25% or more its competitors take. The rationale: if you take good care of your drivers, they will take good care of your customers.
<div id="attachment_36501" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-36501" class="wp-image-36501 size-medium" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/IMG_4327-300x225.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="225" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/IMG_4327-300x225.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/IMG_4327-600x450.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/IMG_4327-768x576.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/IMG_4327-1024x768.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/IMG_4327.jpg 1241w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />Gabriel demonstrates how to use his app called Moovn.</div>
Gabriel began by targeting hotel partners who wanted to book rides for their guests, which helped to drive revenue and get the platform to where it is today. Another way Moovn set itself apart is through a strategic alliance with Vodacom in Africa, which helped offset the operational costs of launching the app. Lastly, there is Gabriel’s personal touch which he uses to recruit his drivers.
“I was in the airport parking with my laptop recruiting drivers, and sometimes I have lunch with our ambassadors too. So being able to connect with people and speak to them and find solutions to their issues is where I get most of my juice. You get to hear things firsthand. This is where we fly, and we are different from other platforms. We don’t have to wait to hear via email but hear it firsthand and that helps us. Whether it is via improvement in the app or improvement in our processes, it is easy to make decisions right there and then without the hierarchy.”
The company already has a presence in nine states in North America with the planned addition of three more states, and an employee count of 150 people across its various divisions. The company has also expanded into Africa with a presence in Tanzania, Johannesburg and Nairobi. It is also present in Dubai.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/30-under-30/2018/06/04/under-30-2018/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: Under 30 2018</a>
The ride-sharing market has been plagued in recent years by several challenges, mostly from local taxi drivers who meet the invasion of technology with animosity, often leading to violent clashes in some African countries. Gabriel, however, believes it’s a matter of negotiation.
“One of the things I often say is that taxi cabs have long existed in most countries. Taxis cannot fulfill the public demand on their own, however, and they depend on the informal sector to offset some of this demand.,” he says.
And with that, the old gift of the gab has managed to successfully bridge the gap between the two parties.
Next up, the Herculean task of getting the world Moovn.

IMG_5790

The Tanzanian Who Aims To Dethrone Uber

It’s early evening at a five-star hotel in Accra in Ghana, where a group of delegates from the European Union and Ghanaian government are meeting to discuss bilateral trade agreements. In the elegant lobby, an attendant mans the helpdesk, trying to resolve the queries of agitated guests who seem unimpressed with the long queues.
At one end of the room, a group of camera-toting journalists saunter aimlessly waiting for an opportunity to snap Ghana’s economic power brokers as they arrive.
Shortly after 7.30PM, the vice president of Ghana strolls in with his security detail and in one stroke, the lobby is bustling, flashes pop like corn and requests for sound bites are hurled in the air.
As the frenzy reaches a feverish pitch, we leave the commotion and make our way past an impressive art piece of Ghana’s first president, Kwame Nkrumah, part of the collection of over 1,500 pieces of art in the hotel. Our destination is the fifth floor where we meet Bozoma Saint John, Silicon Valley darling and Uber’s Chief Brand Officer since last year.
Hired to turn Uber back into a brand people love, Saint John has a daunting task ahead. The company has been hit with a number of scandals and allegations which led to the resignation of CEO Travis Kalanick last year, and the #deleteuber campaign.
In South Africa, Uber drivers have had several clashes with taxi drivers prompting the company to hire private security forces to protect them.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/technology/2017/08/29/ubers-ceo-pick-adds-pressure-resolve-boardroom-brawl/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ: Uber’s CEO Pick Adds Pressure To Resolve Boardroom Brawl</a>
On meeting her, thoughts of Saint John’s herculean task are replaced with impressions of her imposing yet warm personality. Towering at five foot eleven, even without her pink stilettoes, which she teams with a silver jumpsuit, braids and earrings made of Ghanaian Adinkra symbols, her presence is hard to ignore in any room, which can surely be an advantage in the male-dominated corporate space.
“So a good friend of mine called me to come to the Consumer Electronics Summit in Vegas saying they were having a cool kids’ dinner and he needed me to be there. So I stroll into the dinner and Arianna Huffington is sitting there. She looked at me and she said you are the most interesting person in the room right now, what is your name? She told the CEO of JP Morgan Chase who sat next to me to get up and she sat down and said tell me everything about yourself and that is how our friendship started,” says Saint John.
That conversation with Huffington (a founder of The Huffington Post) led to an introduction to Kalanick in Huffington’s home in Los Angeles.
“At the time Uber was going through a lot of challenges and she was on the board and she asked me what would I do. I told her about my experiences taking Ubers and she said you should meet Travis Kalanick. She invited us to her house and what was supposed to be a meet and greet turned out to be a whole day of conversation and brain-storming ideas.”
And the rest is history. Saint John’s list of qualifications, which includes the former head of Music and Entertainment Marketing at PepsiCo and head of marketing for Apple Music, made her the woman for the job. She is one of the few black women to land a senior position at a billion-dollar company. For Saint John, that comes with both positives and negatives.
“If you want to shine like a diamond, you have to be willing to get cut and there has been lots of cuts along the way, in small ways and in big ways. The small ways are about the micro aggression, the comments people make about you and the doubts about your talent; the assertion that your greatness is by accident. It takes a toll on you and your spirit and your self-confidence.
“So having to constantly remind yourself that I am actually talented at this and I do this better than anyone else. In the beginning, people will often remark like, ‘you celebrate yourself so much on Instagram’, but I’m like who else is going to do it? Then all of a sudden, other people start joining the bandwagon and praising the work I do and I’m like ‘I told you I was great’,” says Saint John.
The big cuts along the way have been the most life-changing for Saint John; like losing her husband to cancer in December 2013, four days before his 44th birthday.
“I had never considered that we could die early. It was only six months between his diagnosis and his death so it was not enough time to prepare. Our daughter was only four years old. After his death it really shook me. I was afraid because I did not know if there was ever going to be a recovery in my confidence. Not confidence in work because I knew I could do the job but confidence in life.”
But she turned what was her worst day into her best asset and developed a new philosophy in life.
<div id="attachment_35873" style="width: 693px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-35873" class="wp-image-35873 size-large" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/bozoma-3-683x1024.jpg" alt="" width="683" height="1024" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/bozoma-3-683x1024.jpg 683w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/bozoma-3-300x450.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/bozoma-3-600x900.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/bozoma-3-200x300.jpg 200w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/bozoma-3-768x1152.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/bozoma-3.jpg 1211w" sizes="(max-width: 683px) 100vw, 683px" />Bozoma Saint John. Photo supplied.</div>
“It absolutely lit a fire in me to say that, we don’t know how much time we have and I am going to be great today. I am not waiting for 10 years or 15 years to be great; I am going to be great right now. All the dreams have to happen today, not tomorrow!”
It is that philosophy that Saint John brings to her daunting role at Uber while challenging the world via her Instagram page to #watchmework.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/woman/2015/10/01/young-over-qualified-and-a-woman/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">‘Young, Over Qualified And A Woman!’</a>
“Uber is facing several challenges but I think the addition of Bozoma who happens to be black, a woman and an immigrant is a very strategic move by the brand to help fight some of the negative publicity the company faced last year and that worked. Obviously it helps that Bozoma is an accomplished marketing professional who has a solid track record with some of the world’s prestigious brands,” says John Tawiah, an economist in Ghana.
For Saint John, this is more than a job. It’s about sending a very clear message to three distinct audiences.
“The first is my daughter who I really want to embody for her, what a role model can be. I hope she is going to see the things that I do and that become The Normal for her and she will do better than I have. The second audience is African women and black women. That we can show up as ourselves and still succeed. We don’t need to be like anybody else and I can show up in cornrows, weaves and still be able to let my work speak for itself.
“We talk about cultural appropriation all the time so I find it important to send that message. We need to see each other and know it is ok. The third audience is to show the world that there is an inner intelligence beneath this exterior that we have and you are in charge of your own success.”
Saint John is no stranger to hard work and breaking boundaries. Her innovative ideas at PepsiCo led to the company’s foray into the music festivals and big deals with powerhouse celebrities like Beyoncé and Taylor Swift. In spite of the media buzz and speculation about Uber’s future, the lady who calls herself “superexecumummy” is ready to roll up her sleeves and show the world just how great she is, today.

bozama

Uber’s Chief Brand Officer – ‘I Am Going To Be Great Right Now”

Imagine putting your six-year-old child in a car and telling it to take her to school by a push of a button. It is the future and may be coming sooner than you think.
$87 billion. That’s how much the driverless car market is estimated to be worth by 2030, according to Lux Research, a research and advisory company that specializes in technology and innovation.
It will create the new wave of billionaires and profitable businesses. Worldwide, the race has already begun.
Among the players is General Motors, which invested $1 billion in a self-driving car start-up in 2016; Baidu, a Chinese internet company which launched a $1.5-billion fund dedicated to autonomous-car development; there was a $680-million Uber deal to buy Otto, an autonomous trucking company; and $15 billion was spent by Intel deal to buy Israel’s Mobileye, which makes self-driving sensors and software.
“I am very excited about the era of autonomous cars which will bring down accidents significantly, given that about a third of crashes on US highways, for instance, is due to driver distraction… The car of the future is electrified, autonomous, shared, connected and yearly updated,” says Toby Shapshak, Editor-in-chief at Stuff magazine.
The big question is: how soon are they coming and how will they work?
According to Wayne McCurrie, a Senior Portfolio Manager at Ashburton Investments, autonomous cars are on their way but not quite as people think. He says you will not sit or sleep in the car and be ferried to your destination.
“The driver will still ultimately be in control but not actually drive the car. You will almost be monitoring the system much like an aircraft pilot when the plane is on autopilot,” says McCurrie.
Transportation writer Paris Marx agrees. He says vehicles will have semi-autonomous features, meaning they’ll be able to drive themselves in some limited situations.
Lux Research’s report, Set Autopilot for Profits: Capitalizing on the $87 Billion Self-driving Car Opportunity, also found vehicles with features such as adaptive cruise control, lane departure warning and collision avoidance braking, will account for 92% of autonomous vehicles in 2030 and no fully autonomous car will hit the market.
“Today the autonomous vehicle value chain is already starting to take root, and it involves many players new to the industry. Sensor hardware specialists, like Velodyne LiDAR, are developing products with unprecedented resolution; software and big-data powerhouses, like IBM and Google, are striking up partnerships; and even mapping and connectivity experts, like Nokia and Cisco, are throwing their hats into the ring,” says Cosmin Laslau, Director of Research Products at Lux Research.
According to Laslau, the move to autonomous vehicles will initially be led by the United States and Europe, but China will grow rapidly to claim a 35% share of the 120 million cars sold in 2030, accounting for revenues of $24 billion, against $21 billion for the US market and $20 billion for Europe.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/technology/2017/07/21/push-self-driving-car-rules-overlooks-lack-federal-expertise-ai-tech/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: Push For Self-Driving Car Rules Overlooks Lack Of Federal Expertise In AI Tech</a>
As exciting as the prospects might be, there are many concerns.
There have been violent uproars in some parts of Africa, like South Africa and Kenya, with the introduction of Uber. One concern is driverless cars will fuel the mounting battles with the taxi industry, especially since companies like Uber, already in competition with taxis, are developing their own driverless cars.
“I hope they won’t bring these driverless buses and taxis because I may end up jobless. I am not qualified to do any other job and obviously people will prefer driverless cars because maybe computers are [smarter],” says taxi driver Mthokozisi Nkabinde.
Statistics South Africa, in its National Household Travel Survey, found taxis are the main source of transport for most households at 41.6%. According to the South African National Taxi Council, the taxi industry employs more than 600,000 people and transports about 15 million commuters per day.
“There are no jobs in this country and when they take away the only way we make money we will mobilize and fight with the government and make sure they fix it,” says Nkabinde.
Another question is how these cars will be brought into the market.
In South Africa, people are divided. In a recent study by accounting and consulting firm, Deloitte, half of consumers prefer tech companies while the rest choose traditional car manufactures. The study also found 47% of consumers want limited self-driving technology and 39% prefer fully self-driving cars.
“Tech companies tend to want to move toward a fleet model, where people wouldn’t own their own vehicles, but would use an app to request a vehicle on demand, similar to what Uber already offers; while traditional automotive companies think that people will still want to own their own self-driving cars and fleets will just be another option,” says Marx.
Overall acceptance of autonomous technology keeps growing.
“Those who settle for a reactive mindset, rather than preparing for the long term, will be at greater risk as consumer acceptance for autonomous technology further accelerates,” says Craig Giffi, Vice Chairman at Deloitte, in a press statement.
Many start-ups are working towards this future. One of them is Nuro, a company that has found a niche in self-driving vehicles designed to transform local commerce.
<div id="attachment_35656" style="width: 501px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-35656" class=" wp-image-35656" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/Nuro-founders-Dave-Ferguson-and-Jiajun-Zhu-e1521707033306-300x169.jpg" alt="" width="491" height="277" />Nuro founders Dave Ferguson and Jiajun Zhu (Photo supplied)</div>
Former engineers from Google&#8217;s self-driving car project, Dave Ferguson and Jiajun Zhu, swapped the opportunity to make self-driving passenger cars for goods delivery services. In January, they raised $92 million to launch Nuro.
“We started Nuro to make products that will have a massive impact on the things we do every day. Our world-class software, hardware, and product teams have spent the past 18 months applying their expertise to deliver on this mission. The result is a self-driving vehicle designed to run your errands for you. It is poised to change the way that businesses interact with their local customers,” says Ferguson, in a statement made available to FORBES AFRICA.
Nuro’s new vehicle is designed specifically to move goods between and among businesses, neighbourhoods and homes. The fully autonomous vehicle is unmanned and about half the width of a passenger car.
“We aspire to lead a new wave of robotics applications that make life easier for everyone and give us more time to do things we love. We are living in extraordinary times where advancements in robotics, artificial intelligence and computer vision are making it possible to imagine products and services that could not have existed just 10 years ago,” says Zhu.
Similar to the Nuro vehicle, the future driverless cars will be furnished with cameras, radar and light detection, and ranging sensors to help them visualize and map their surroundings. All of this data will then be processed by an on-board computer using artificial intelligence to instruct the vehicle where and how to drive and whether it needs to react to any of its surroundings, such as a vehicle that hasn’t obeyed a stop light or a child running into the street.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/billionaires/2017/11/03/roadblock-elon-musks-net-worth-drops-800-million-day-amid-tesla-woes/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: Roadblock: Elon Musk&#8217;s Net Worth Drops $800 Million In A Day</a>
There are challenges to the inception of driverless cars though.
Elon Musk’s Tesla, for example, is one of the few companies testing autonomous vehicles and its vehicle was involved in a fatal accident. An investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board in the US found that the feature installed in the car should have required the driver to have his hands on the steering wheel at all times and should have only worked in restricted areas. Tesla did not have these limitations in its software, so the driver used it for extended periods of time while not paying attention to the road. The vehicle eventually hit a truck and killed the man behind the Tesla’s wheel.
“Another challenge is that bad weather can obstruct or interfere with some of the sensors, which would then result in the vehicle’s computer having an incomplete picture of its surroundings, which could impair its ability to make the right driving decisions,” says Marx.
<div id="attachment_35655" style="width: 263px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-35655" class=" wp-image-35655" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/ParisMarxcropped-300x300.jpg" alt="" width="253" height="253" />Paris Marx (Photo supplied)</div>
Urban areas might also be a problem. In the United States, according to Marx, there are only a few self-driving vehicle services open to the public, and they are exclusive to suburban areas with wide roads and not much traffic in southern states like Arizona and Florida, where the weather is nearly always clear and sunny. Those are the kinds of areas where self-driving cars will stay for a while.
Safety concerns also need to be resolved.
“[Driverless cars] have been observed running red lights, going the wrong way down one-way streets, and recent reports show that they have trouble detecting bicycles and putting cyclists at risk. Most companies working on self-driving cars are being cautious about testing the vehicles and putting them in situations where they could get in accidents, but there are some, like Tesla and Uber, that seem to be taking more risks. A lot of stories have been published about the accidents that Uber’s vehicles have gotten into, the times they’ve run red lights, and how they ignored bike lanes in San Francisco,” says Marx.
Marx adds that it’s unlikely that autonomous cars will become common in American or European cities in the next five years because many cities are placing restrictions on vehicle use to give priority to bicycles and to turn streets into public spaces.
“If they become common in any part of the African continent, it would likely be in wealthier suburbs or gated communities,” he says.
Driverless vehicles are presented as the solution to traffic congestion that cities all over the world are facing but, according to Marx, they’re unlikely to make a big difference.
“Simply moving people from regular cars to self-driving cars doesn’t reduce the amount of space being taken up by those vehicles, and it’s likely that if the cost of using those vehicles is low enough, more people will want to use them, increasing the number of kilometers that vehicles will travel in our cities, thus making congestion even worse,” he says.
The answer, according to Marx, is to invest in subway, streetcar and light rail system and to give buses their own lanes so they are not slowed down by traffic.
In Africa, McCurrie says certain areas could be quickly adapted to accommodate driverless cars but it will take 20 years for full autonomous cars to exist in developed countries, and longer in developing countries.
There will be consequences for the manufacturing industry. McCurrie says it could easily bring massive capital investment in infrastructure.
“The market will most likely accept some sort of premium for driver assist cars initially but eventually economics will have to rule,” says McCurrie.
In the short term, Marx suggests the biggest impact will be to goods transportation, where Nuro has seen an opportunity.
“This is already happening at mines in Australia and in the tar sands in Canada. There will likely also be more automation of transport trucks, at least for the segments of their routes on highways, in the next few years,” he says.
For many, the best outcome would be for driverless vehicles to connect suburban residents with a public transport hub and reduce the costs of public transportation.
“On services with fixed tracks, such as subways and trains, it shouldn’t be too difficult to automate drivers and reduce operating costs, which could potentially allow the transport agency to increase the level of service, meaning there would be a shorter wait time between trains. The same could be done with buses, especially if they’re given dedicated lanes where detecting other vehicles wouldn’t be an issue,” says Marx.
It seems we are a long way from sleeping while a car takes us to our destination.

Roads Without Drivers

Flying taxis sound like a futuristic idea, but Uber wants to test the idea in Los Angeles by 2020. The traffic-laden city is the second city in the US, <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/briansolomon/2017/04/25/flying-cars-by-2020-uber-wants-you-to-push-button-g" target="_blank" rel="noopener">following Dallas-Fort Worth</a>, to be selected as a test bed for UberAir&#8217;s network of air taxis.
Uber&#8217;s plan is to string together a network of electrical vertical take-off and landing vehicles, commonly called eVTOL, and make them available on-demand. Similar to helicopters, the eVTOL aircraft would take off and land on the tops of buildings and be able to cover distances more quickly and directly compared to cars stuck in traffic on Los Angeles congested roads.
According to Uber&#8217;s own analysis, a 200-mph all electric ride across Los Angeles would be &#8220;price competitive&#8221; to an UberX ride of the same distance. It will also be much faster than a car ride on the ground, Uber claims. In one example, Uber&#8217;s research predicts that an UberAir ride from Los Angeles International Airport to the Staples Center would take less than 30 minutes using UberAir. An UberX ride between the same distances generally lasts closer to an hour and a half.
&#8220;Just as skyscrapers allowed cities to use limited land more efficiently, urban air transportation will use three-dimensional airspace to alleviate transportation congestion on the ground,&#8221; Uber wrote in its <a href="https://www.uber.com/info/elevate/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">white-paper on Uber Elevate</a>, its name for the overall network, which it unveiled in October 2016.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/technology/2017/08/29/ubers-ceo-pick-adds-pressure-resolve-boardroom-brawl/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: Uber&#8217;s CEO Pick Adds Pressure To Resolve Boardroom Brawl</a>
In Los Angeles, Uber plans to partner with Sandstone Properties to develop take-off and landing hubs for its network of eVTOL planes and plans to bring on additional real estate partners ahead of the anticipated launch, the company said. In addition to Los Angeles, Uber is working to launch similar tests in Dallas-Fort Worth and Dubai.
By the time the Olympics come to Los Angeles in 2028, Uber&#8217;s Chief Product Officer Jeff Holden said in a press release that he expects the service to be commercially available and already in &#8220;heavy use&#8221; by Los Angeles residents. At scale, the company envisions tens of thousands of flights happening in Los Angeles each day, according to Holden.
In April, Uber first announced that it had already signed on partners to produce the eVTOL aircraft to be used on the network, including <a href="http://www.aurora.aero/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Aurora Flight Sciences</a>,<a href="http://www.pipistrel-usa.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Pipistrel Aircraft</a>, <a href="http://www.embraer.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Embraer</a>, <a href="http://www.mooney.com/en/index.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Mooney</a>, and <a href="http://www.bellhelicopter.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Bell Helicopter</a>.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/billionaires/2017/11/03/roadblock-elon-musks-net-worth-drops-800-million-day-amid-tesla-woes/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: Elon Musk&#8217;s Net Worth Drops $800 Million In A Day Amid Tesla Woes</a>
But the choice of Los Angeles also means Uber will be working in what&#8217;s also a hotbed for next-generation aerospace activity. Along with Elon Musk’s <a href="http://www.spacex.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">SpaceX</a>, Burt Rutan’s <a href="http://www.scaled.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Scaled Composites</a> that’s developing Paul Allen’s massive <a href="http://www.stratolaunch.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Stratolaunch</a> plane and Richard Branson’s new <a href="https://virginorbit.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Virgin Orbit</a> operation in Long Beach, the region is home to growing cluster of startups. These include <a href="https://www.rocketlabusa.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Rocket Lab</a>, <a href="http://www.phasefour.io/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Phase Four</a>, <a href="https://www.relativityspace.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Relativity</a>, <a href="http://whittinghillaerospace.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Whitinghill Aerospace</a>, <a href="http://masten.aero/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Masten Space Systems</a> and <a href="http://www.interorbital.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Interorbital Systems</a>. While Uber will be a new entrant into the already vibrant aerospace community, it&#8217;s already planning on holding its next aviation summit in Los Angeles in 2018.
&#8220;We are bringing UberAir to Los Angeles in no small part because Mayor Garcetti has embraced technology and innovation, making L.A. a hub for the future,&#8221; Holden said in the release. &#8220;In this case, technology will allow L.A. residents to literally fly over the city&#8217;s historically bad traffic, giving them time back to use in far more productive ways, whether more leisure time with friends and family or more time to work.&#8221; &#8211; Written by <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/bizcarson/" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-ga-track="contrib block byline">Biz Carson </a>, FORBES STAFF

Uber Wants To Bring Its Flying Taxis To Traffic-Congested Los Angeles

When we talk about the sharing economy, there are a lot of connotations around it, both positive and negative. The first two companies that come to mind are Airbnb and Uber, with the latter having its fair share of controversies regarding regulation not just in South Africa, but around the world.
Airbnb has been a pioneer of the sharing economy, with currently over 3 million listings spread over 65,000 cities in 191 countries. Since its inception in August 2008, the San Francisco-based company has hosted over 160 million guests globally, and that number continues to grow.
The astronomical rise of Airbnb that has shaken up the hotel industry is now worth over $31 billion (at the time of print), and raised over $1 billion in its latest round of funding (March 2017), bringing its total raised to date at over $3 billion.
It’s crazy to think that the company putting a huge dent in the hotel industry owns no property, at all.
In March 2017, the company shared some interesting insights through a report called <a href="https://press.atairbnb.com/app/uploads/2017/03/WomensReport_print_3-2-17_v1-2-1.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Women Hosts and Airbnb: Building a Global Community</a>. It said that while it cannot tear down the obstacles to empowerment women face worldwide, its platform is powered by a growing community of women hosts who are connecting with guests, each other and their local communities.
Airbnb says historically, female hosts have outnumbered their male counterparts around the world; and an estimated over 1 million women host on Airbnb, making up 55% of the global Airbnb host community. Additionally, women host at 120% the rate of men.
The company’s female hosts have been earning a significant income around the world, and in 2016 alone, South Africa came third by most earnings per host at over R25,350 (nearly $2,000), behind the US at $6,600 and Spain at $3,600.
Airbnb estimates that over 50,000 women around the world have used income from its platform to support entrepreneurship for themselves, launching a business, or as direct investment capital for a new business they are starting. The report also stated that globally, 62% of single mother hosts use their Airbnb income to help afford their home.
The South African economy has been boosted by R2.4 billion ($184 million) in 2016, which is an estimated sum of guest spending and host income, said Airbnb in a post in May 2017.
South African hosts saw over 400,000 guest arrivals into their homes last year alone, a massive spike from the 38,000 back in 2014.
The estimated income and guest arrivals in South Africa came from 16,000 Airbnb hosts spread across the country who are ‘regular people’.
“A typical host is 45 years old and 40 percent of them are freelancers, entrepreneurs or self-employed,” said the company.
Lize Hartley, a 28-year-old executive head within the telecommunications industry living in the Cape Town CBD, lets out a property she bought that is five blocks away from her current apartment.
Making the decision to become a host on Airbnb was a ‘no-brainer’ for Hartley, who had been renting out her guest room initially.
“I crunched the numbers, working out what kind of occupation rate and average price per night I needed to cover my bond and other costs; I was lucky enough to put down a higher-than-average – in terms of percentage – deposit, which also helped remove some of the risk,” says Hartley.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/technology/2017/08/29/ubers-ceo-pick-adds-pressure-resolve-boardroom-brawl/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Uber&#8217;s CEO Pick Adds Pressure To Resolve Boardroom Brawl</a>
Most of Hartley’s guests are international travelers – she estimates this to be about 85% – and thinks her listing shows up relatively high on the list due to good reviews.
“Once people land on your listing, good reviews are important, as are good photographs, which I had done professionally as soon as the place was ready to be rented.”
Hartley thinks the biggest element of empowerment is that Airbnb is a means for people to own property, who otherwise might not have been able to.
“It is especially important to me as a woman; we know that women don’t own nearly as much property as men do worldwide, without even delving into patriarchal property rights, wage gaps, and other systemic injustices that hinder women from owning property.”
Moreover, there’s no income disparity between Airbnb hosts based on gender, so the platform acts as an equalizer in a world where women have to fight for equality every day, says Hartley.
Buying a property to let out on Airbnb has always been an investment for Hartley, who looks at the long-term focus, rather than a means of increasing her disposable income. “I don’t treat the money I get from this as supplementary income, instead, all of that money goes straight into paying the bond off more quickly.”
Guests that Hartley got to know better, even returning ones from the US, have been interesting, she says.
“From lawyers working in Baltimore alongside the Black Lives Matter movement, to former national cross-country skiers, and art lovers opening galleries on the other side of the world, we really have met some incredible people.”
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/woman/2017/07/11/workplace-future-now/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Workplace Of The Future &#8211; Or Now?</a>
Another already empowered female with a successful career is 43-year-old humanitarian aid Belinda Bowling from De Waterkant, in Cape Town, whose Airbnb hosting has gone on to create a micro-business.
“It’s been fantastically empowering for my housekeeper and business partner, Nozi, who looks after the house on a day-to-day basis, without whom I couldn’t make this venture work successfully,” says Bowling.
Nozi has got an iPhone now, and we are able to communicate on bookings as if in the same room together, through the use of innovative apps that support the Airbnb phenomenon, she says.
“She’s also training up other unemployed women from her community, and sometimes outsources to them during busy times; she’s creating a micro-business, and becoming much more financially independent.”
“I’m enormously grateful for this outcome of this venture,” adds Bowling.
<div id="attachment_33785" style="width: 320px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-33785" class=" wp-image-33785" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Belinda-Bowling-high-res-200x300.jpg" alt="" width="310" height="465" />Belinda Bowling (Photo supplied)</div>
Bowling built her house in Betty’s Bay nine years ago, which was more of an emotional investment, rather than a financial one, she says.
“It was a home for me in South Africa that gave me much-desired roots, bearing in mind my then transient and nomadic life working in humanitarian aid and international development.”
Due to her emotional commitment to the house, the decision to rent it out was something she avoided until 18 months ago, when it became a financial necessity.
“Returning home to work in Cape Town, I could no longer afford to maintain a second home that didn’t generate any income.”
Despite being wary of having strangers in her house and personal space, the perceived risks implicit in holiday rentals and the horror stories about nightmare guests, Bowling’s experience has been nothing but a very positive one, with a few lessons learned along the way, she says.
The experience and the income has both exceeded Bowling’s expectations, and some of her guests from Betty’s Bay have come to stay with her at her home in De Waterkant.
“I think Airbnb is a lot like Tinder, it matches people very successfully based on their interests, intentions and tastes. This is what makes it so disruptive and revolutionary – it’s highly personal, despite being a [impersonal] tech platform.”
Airbnb homes are (mainly) just that: (bespoke) homes, says Bowling.
“Not hotels, or mass market villa rentals all crammed with the same furniture. So the chances of the relationship being a positive one is much higher right from the starting point.”
Bowling loves hosting on Airbnb because being a part of ‘special family times’ has been most rewarding, from the ‘glam pad’ for the bride and her bridesmaids to a temporary home for first-time parents wanting to bond with their little one.
“These are intimate experiences that live with guests forever, and it’s an honor to be a part of that.”  &#8211; Written by Nafisa Akabor

The Sharing Economy: 400,000 Guests At Home

Uber&#8217;s divided board managed to agree on one thing over the weekend: Expedia&#8217;s Dara Khosrowshahi <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/miguelhelft/2017/08/27/uber-names-expedias-dara-khosrowshahi-as-its-new-ceo/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">should be the company&#8217;s new CEO</a>. An official announcement is expected soon.
As of now, there are no signs that a bitter lawsuit pitting two of Uber&#8217;s largest shareholders &#8211; both of them board members &#8211; against each other, is nearing resolution. And that is odd, since it seems unlikely that Khosrowshahi, who is said to be <a href="https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1324424/000132442417000042/a8-k8282017.htm" target="_blank" rel="noopener">ready to accept the job</a>, would want to jump into the middle of a war for control of the company.
Yet on Monday, the dispute between Uber&#8217;s former CEO Travis Kalanick and venture capital firm Benchmark showed no signs of abating. In a new court filing, Kalanick accused Benchmark of drawing out its lawsuit only to &#8220;publicly slander&#8221; his character.
&#8220;Benchmark desires to publicly attack Mr. Kalanick, and to peddle its allegations to the media, but that conduct is directly contrary to the interest of Uber, as announced by its Board of Directors,&#8221; the court filing said.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/focus/2015/10/01/luck-uber-bucks/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">From Down On His Luck To Uber Bucks</a>
On August 10, Benchmark sued Kalanick for fraud, breaches of fiduciary duty and breaches of contractual obligations.
As part of the suit, Benchmark wants the court to nullify a June 2016 agreement that created three additional board seats. It also wants the former CEO to be removed from the board and banned from participating in the search for his replacement.
While the two sides are still fighting over whether or not the case should be sent to arbitration, Benchmark&#8217;s argument that Kalanick is interfering in the CEO search is now a mute point.
Khosrowshahi will already have his hands full with Uber&#8217;s other litany of problems, from repairing an internal culture to a <a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/technology/2017/08/18/judge-tells-uber-misled-court-slams-waymo-greedy/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">lawsuit against Waymo</a> over self-driving car technology that&#8217;s scheduled to go to court in a month. Having to clean up the board mess would be an unwelcome distraction.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/focus/2017/08/25/amazon-lays-whole-foods-strategy-shakes-wall-street-anew/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Amazon Lays Out Whole Food Strategy And Shakes Up Wall Street Anew</a>
Also on Monday, Travis Kalanick ally and early Uber investor Shervin Pishevar, who on Friday <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/miguelhelft/2017/08/24/uber-investor-shervin-pishevar-seeks-to-intervene-in-legal-case-between-benchmark-and-kalanick/#40d1578b34d8" target="_blank" rel="noopener">decided to insert himself in the legal case</a>, celebrated Khosrowshahi with a dig at Benchmark.
&#8220;I applaud the Board’s decision to make Dara Khosrowshahi the next CEO of Uber, and we are gratified that Benchmark did not succeed in subverting the CEO selection process,&#8221; Pishevar said in an statement. &#8211; Written by <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/bizcarson/" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-ga-track="contrib block byline">Biz Carson</a>, FORBES STAFF

Uber’s CEO Pick Adds Pressure To Resolve Boardroom Brawl

Both Uber and Waymo found themselves being scolded by a federal judge who called one side “greedy” and accused the other of repeatedly misleading the court.
During a tension-filled court hearing on Wednesday in San Francisco, Waymo asked the court to hold Uber and its lawyers in contempt for dragging their feet when it comes to disclosing information about documents in their possession.
U.S. District Judge William Alsup, who is presiding over the high-profile suit between the two companies, specifically called out Uber’s lawyer, Arturo Gonzalez of Morrison &amp; Foerster, for misleading the court “time and time again.”
At one point, Alsup even threatened to have Gonzalez take the stand <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/mattdrange/2017/05/11/judge-refers-waymos-uber-lawsuit-to-justice-department-grants-partial-injunction-in-case/#67e80a2f41ff" target="_blank" rel="noopener">during the upcoming trial</a> to explain why Uber has been slow to respond to request for documents, including the 14,000 files that were allegedly stolen from Google by an engineer who went on to lead Uber’s self-driving car efforts.
“You’ll be a good witness. You’ll be right there explaining to the jury and explaining this story,” Alsup told Uber’s lawyer, pointing to the stand next to him.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/technology/2017/07/21/push-self-driving-car-rules-overlooks-lack-federal-expertise-ai-tech/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Push For Self-Driving Car Rules Overlooks Lack Of Federal Expertise In AI Tech</a>
While there’s a chance Gonzalez could still take the stand during trial, Alsup seemed more inclined to let the jury hear about the many deadlines Uber’s legal team missed or dodged in the lead-up to the trial, which is scheduled to begin in October.
“I am concerned that Mr. Gonzalez failed to disclose that he had the documents and took a long time to come clean,” Alsup said. “I am inclined… to tell the jury exactly this scenario: that he was ordered to come clean, did not come clean, ordered to come clean again, and did not come clean — finally in June or July came clean.”
In a heated exchange, Gonzalez fired back at the judge for buying into a “completely false premise” and said there will never be a time when anyone proves that his firm or Uber ever concealed the 14,000 documents.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/billionaires/2017/06/12/elon-musks-goals-tesla-will-require-billions-capital-investors-cheer/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Elon Musk&#8217;s Goals For Tesla Will Require Billions More In Capital; Investors Cheer</a>
While much of Alsup’s scolding was directed at Uber, he wasn’t happy with Waymo either.
In a previous court order, the Google spin-off company had to narrow down its list of trade secret violations from over 100 to nine to be argued at trial. When Waymo asked to retain the right to argue the rest, Alsup said if it wanted the whole lot, he could postpone the case for a year, potentially to Waymo&#8217;s own detriment.
“You can’t have everything,” Alsup said. “You want 121? I’ll give you that. We can push this out another couple of years and they’ll have cars on the street because you’re being greedy.&#8221;
In the end, Waymo acquiesced and agreed to move forward with their limited selection. The case, in which Uber’s lawyers said could involve “potentially multi-billion dollar damages,” is scheduled to begin in early October. &#8211; Written by <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/bizcarson/" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-ga-track="contrib block byline">Biz Carson</a>, FORBES STAFF

Judge Tells Uber It ‘Misled The Court’, Slams Waymo For ‘Being Greedy’

A House subcommittee approved critical legislation for the fast-developing driverless car movement this week that sets specific rules for how many such vehicles can be on U.S. roads and the federal government’s role in regulating them. While it would give companies developing the technology the national framework they want, it also raises questions over who is best-suited to ensure this cutting-edge technology is safe.
Under <a href="http://docs.house.gov/meetings/IF/IF17/20170719/106309/BILLS-115pih-HighlyAutomatedVehicleTesti-U2.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">proposed rules</a> that will come before the full House for a vote in September, manufacturers could put up to 100,000 autonomous vehicles per company on U.S. roads every year, with a requirement that they certify the safety of those vehicles with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, or NHTSA. If approved, the proposal would preempt the current patchwork of state-level rules for operating self-driving cars and trucks. They build off a basic set of guidelines <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/alanohnsman/2016/09/19/u-s-gives-green-light-to-self-driving-car-push-setting-federal-ground-rules/#672c0ad13652" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">issued by President Barack Obama’s Transportation Department</a> last September.
“The need for this legislation was laid out by the Obama Administration,” said Rep. Bob Latta, the Ohio Republican who chairs the House Subcommittee on Digital Commerce and Consumer Protection. “From the front bumper to the back bumper, whether it is a car, a pickup truck or a van, how the vehicle works and is designed should be the province of the federal government as has been the case for more than 50 years.”
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/woman/2017/07/11/workplace-future-now/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">The Workplace Of The Future &#8211; Or Now?</a>
California, which has <a href="https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/dmv/detail/vr/autonomous/testing" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">issued permits to 36 companies</a> testing about 200 autonomous vehicles in the state, would no longer be able to set its own guidelines if the federal proposal becomes law. But whether federal safety officials ultimately are better-suited to validate manufacturers’ safety claims for the artificial intelligence, algorithms and next-generation vision and sensing technologies that go into self-driving cars remains in question.
“There’s this whole gray ground about who is in the best position to regulate these new cars, which go beyond the traditional car into almost driving a computer and software,” said attorney Sharon Klein, a partner in the autonomous vehicle practice for Pepper Hamilton LLP. “There’s been this debate about whether NHTSA as an agency should continue to be involved in deployment as well.”
The new rules rely on companies to certify the safety of their systems. The concern is that NHTSA, the country&#8217;s primary auto safety regulator, lacks the software and computer science expertise needed to validate their technical claims, Klein said.
“It comes down to a question of who is going to be watching the manufacturers?” she told Forbes.
Along with the growing number of robotic vehicles in California, states including Michigan, Massachusetts and Nevada are home to ever larger test fleets. Waymo, the Alphabet Inc. unit created last year to commercialize Google&#8217;s self-driving car technology, has already begun a large-scale public test in Arizona that may eventually grow to hundreds of driverless vehicles <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/alanohnsman/2017/04/25/waymo-taps-phoenix-for-a-big-public-test-of-google-self-driving-car-tech/#3769032c6141" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">ferrying people around Phoenix</a>.
General Motors, Uber, Lyft, Ford companies are following suit, and Tesla intends to give its electric vehicles full autonomous capability within the next year or two via over-the-air updates.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/homepage/2017/07/07/tesla-loses-valuable-u-s-carmaker-crown-stock-takes-12-billion-hit/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Tesla Loses &#8216;Most Valuable U.S. Carmaker&#8217; Crown As Stock Takes $12 Billion Hit</a>
In 2016, NHTSA and the Transportation Department <a href="https://www.transportation.gov/AV/federal-automated-vehicles-policy-september-2016" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">defined 15 areas</a> that manufacturers need to comply with when they put self-driving vehicles on the road. That basic framework will put the agency in an administrative role, ensuring certain benchmarks are met, despite lacking specific knowledge of the software and algorithms powering autonomous systems.
“There’s no way NHTSA has the technical capability to do this right now,” said Mike Ramsey, an automotive tech analyst with Gartner Research in Detroit.
“NHTSA is really the arbiter of ‘does it appear that you have done all the things you need to do?’ It’s counting on the fear of deaths and lawsuits that could arise to prevent carmakers from doing something egregious,” he said.
Insurance companies will also act as a “shadow regulator” to keep manufacturers honest in their technical claims, Ramsey said. “The fact is unsafe (autonomous) technology would quickly become uninsurable.”
<a href="http://www.consumerwatchdog.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Consumer Watchdog</a>, a safety advocacy group, called on congress to give NHTSA more resources to better address this major technological shift and opposed the reduced role of individual states to regulate robotic cars and trucks.
“Lost in the hyperbole over robot cars is a realistic assessment of the likely costs to both consumers and taxpayers particularly over the coming decades, when robot cars and human drivers will share a ‘hybrid highway,’ John Simpson, director of the Santa Monica, California-based group’s privacy project, said in a <a href="http://www.consumerwatchdog.org/newsrelease/consumer-watchdog-calls-california-representatives-oppose-congressional-robot-car-legisl" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">statement</a>.
“Pre-empting the states’ ability to fill the void left by federal inaction leaves us at the mercy of manufacturers as they use our public highways as their private laboratories however they wish with no safety protections at all,” said Simpson, who called on California House members to oppose the subcommittee proposal.
For its part, the California DMV said it doesn’t comment on pending legislation. The department has been tasked with setting regulations for the testing and deployment of autonomous vehicles on state roadways since 2014. &#8211; Written by <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/alanohnsman/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Alan Ohnsman</a>, FORBES STAFF

Push For Self-Driving Car Rules Overlooks Lack Of Federal Expertise In AI Tech

These are the words from the chorus of Uber dadi, a hip-hop song written for Uber by Fuzile Nhlapo, one of thousands of Uber drivers across Africa.
On a hot afternoon in Johannesburg, Nhlapo walks into our offices in Sandton and, like most taxi drivers, he’s talkative and has many stories to tell.
He grew up singing in a boys’ choir in high school, in Tweeling, in eastern Free State. His love for music grew. After matriculating he moved to the Vaal to seek greener pastures.
“I had to hustle. My first job when I came to Vaal was as a storeman at a supermarket, then I became a merchandiser and then got a modelling job in Bloemfontein,” says Nhlapo.
The 30-year-old rapper did a series of studies, eventually earning a certificate in media studies, marketing and sports administration, before working for the South African Football Association (Safa).
In 2008, luck was on his side, when a friend didn’t pitch for work at Safa. The company offered him the job instead.
“I did sports administration and coaching courses. I was responsible for the Northern Cape regions until after the World Cup in 2010 and then I was without a job again,” he says.
Nhlapo desperately wanted to be an entrepreneur in music. He got his foot in the door by landing a job as a marketer at South African producer, Arthur Mafokate’s production company. Here, he got to learn the music industry.
“I was searching for a job but I was ready to go for my passion. It happened that I met Chomee, Arthur’s artist and we exchanged contacts. I then got Arthur’s number from his website and called him, I approached him as a groupie, but I knew I had a mission to work for him. But then one day Chomee called me and said Arthur was looking for a marketer.”
He applied and got the job.
“What I can tell you about Arthur is that he’s a great mentor. He hired me for a marketing job but taught me the ins and outs of entertainment. He played a big role in my entertainment career,” says Nhlapo.
He left to start his company, Black Excellence, with the aim to produce his own music. This wasn’t easy.
“I decided to open my own company, thinking that now I’m groomed enough, I can do this. I obviously made a premature decision and money was wasted because there were other aspects of business I didn’t take into consideration. I ended up getting deep into debt.”
He had to sell his car to pay off his debts.
“I was penniless and unemployed. A friend then got me a job as a merchandiser again, [but] I was not making enough money, I decided to quit.”
He ended up washing dishes at a Chinese restaurant for a small pay. Here, he met his future wife, from Zambia, who worked as a cashier.
Because life was hard in Johannesburg they returned to Tweeling.
“I was at home and someone called me and asked if I had a professional driving permit and license, and she said there’s a job for a shuttle driver and host at Emerald Resort &amp; Casino.”
He had to use his last penny to return to Johannesburg. While working at the casino, he heard, by word of mouth, about Uber, a technology company connecting riders with drivers, through a smartphone app. Nhlapo says being a part of the Uber network gives him the opportunity to be the CEO of his own cab.
“I started to research Uber and after a few weeks a cousin called to tell me about a guy who wants a driver. Since then, I have never been this happy and financially secure,” he says.
Nhlapo says he joined Uber because he could work according to his own schedule. It has also afforded him the chance to connect with people in a way that neither of his other jobs really had.
“There is more to Uber than transporting people from A to B. It gives us the chance to network and acknowledge other cultures because as black people we only know of our culture,” he says.
He jokingly says his communication skills have also improved, especially his English. He’s planning to release three songs; a hip-hop song for Uber and others, Kwaito and house.
“I’m mostly gonna play the songs in the car because I also want our riders to enjoy it,” he says.
This ambitious lad believes his songs will top the charts.
He says Oliver Mtukudzi is his favorite African musician. Like Mtukudzi, Nhlapo loves playing the guitar.
Unlike Mtukudzi, you can summon Nhlapo with an app.

Rapping On A Rough Road

Two years ago, Uber was unheard of. Today it’s a buzzword. You could argue that Rudolf Makopole Malaka has been on the same fast track. From humble township beginnings to a property on an estate; with three Uber cars and three companies – he owes it all to the mobile app.
Uber gives drivers the opportunity to be the CEO of their own company – they own their own cars and set their hours. Connecting riders with drivers through a smartphone app, users submit a trip request, which is then routed to Uber drivers. Since 2013, the online ride-hailing service has taken off in South Africa.
“People lack jobs. We decided to join Uber – not just to make money but to create job opportunities for our fellow brothers who don’t have jobs because we know how hard it is not to have a job. We’ve been there,” he says.
“I spent weeks eating only Weet-Bix. You go to school on an empty stomach, you walk long distances. I don’t want my kids to go through that, I don’t want kids from the location to go through that,” he says.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-4103" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/IMG_5292-200x300.jpg" alt="" width="200" height="300" />
After getting his degree in IT, he was unemployed and disheartened.
“I’ve been jobless and I’m a qualified auditor and qualified in IT. You go to school, you get the qualification but you don’t get the job. You wait, you go to interviews, they say they’ll call you but they don’t call you. You can’t just sit around and wait,” he says.
He brainstormed new opportunities. He started his first company in property development which grew into construction and image consulting – styling people, homes and their businesses. Riding on the momentum of his success, he started an IT company and became an Uber partner. A far cry from scouring through the classifieds and being rejected at interviews, he now makes about R150,000 (around $11,000) a month. With a fleet of three cars and looking to expand to 15 by next year, business is booming.
“Uber is a platform to make a change. We will have five cars by the end of the month. That’s five families we’re feeding. We’re making a change,” he says.
It should be so simple but Uber has faced its fair share of challenges. In June, cab drivers in Paris locked down the city in protest; operations were banned in Germany after a court ruled that Uber violated transport laws; in South Korea employees linked to the company were charged with running an illegal taxi firm; and in South Africa, metered-taxis are demanding a clampdown on the new kid on the block. They claim it’s operating illegally, flouting regulations and putting passengers at risk.
“A meter taxi attacked me. I was protecting the client. I said ‘you can smash my car, you can do whatever you do, but not to my client’. He was trying to pull my client. The problem is that they don’t understand competition. They say they’re taking our customers but what about other public transport? It’s a client preference to use us. We don’t scout for clients, we’re requested.”
Malaka sets himself apart from the rest by putting his drivers through his image consulting business. Putting professionalism at the fore, his drivers are dressed to impress, paying attention to every detail from the cut of the suit to the color of the tie; the radio station and temperature are adjusted for the customer; and a charger and auxiliary cable are always made available. His drivers go through training every month to ensure that their Uber ratings stay high.
“We want to empower them – they work for us for only two years. We want our Uber drivers to buy their own cars. We give them advice, we make sure that they know how to save. Then we hire other people. It’s a chain – we’re empowering you, we want you to empower someone else.”
“I moved up. I go back to where I came from because I know I left people there who helped me to get where I am. You can’t forget where you come from. I employ people from the townships because I know the struggles,” he says.
He’s driven and he’s making it, one Uber ride at a time.

From Down  On His Luck  To Uber Bucks

Its 4PM on a Friday in Johannesburg and the traffic is building up. All of Johannesburg is going home, but the night is young for Cindy Mashao, a Uber driver. She picks us up from our Sandton offices, and lets us ride with her.
Uber is a technology company connecting riders with drivers through a smartphone app. Mashao owns a hair salon in Alexandra, a black township in Gauteng, but now, as part of the Uber network, she has, like her counterparts worldwide, the opportunity to be the CEO of her own taxi.
Mashao was one of Uber’s first female drivers in South Africa when she joined the network late last year. In just under two years of its operation in South Africa, 4% of Uber’s drivers are women. In the United States (US), the corresponding number is 14%.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="size-medium wp-image-30155 alignleft" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/Uber-driver-095-200x300.jpg" alt="" width="200" height="300" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Uber-driver-095-200x300.jpg 200w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Uber-driver-095-300x451.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Uber-driver-095-600x903.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Uber-driver-095-681x1024.jpg 681w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Uber-driver-095.jpg 680w" sizes="(max-width: 200px) 100vw, 200px" />
“Given that the US as a country is significantly bigger than South Africa and Uber has been in the US for five years, South Africa being at this level is really exceptional and the growth possibilities are very exciting,” says Samantha Allenberg, Uber’s spokesperson.
Mashao expertly navigates the back roads to get out of grid-locked Sandton at this peak hour.
“I stay far away from Sandton [as far as possible] when I’m working,” she says. With most businesses operating in this affluent part of Johannesburg, traffic is always a nightmare.
Mashao is a live wire and brimming with stories. As we drive to her usual spot, which is a petrol-station in Morningside, she tells us that drunk customers are her favorite because they make driving exciting and the ride eventful. There is never a dull moment. Her passengers in the morning are usually stressed office-goers, so there is little room for friendly banter.
Its 4.30PM and we start in Morningside at the end of the ever-busy Rivonia road where she waits for ride-requests.
“Morningside is like home for me. It’s where I started,” she says as she greets other drivers, mostly male.
Listening to the radio on the commute all day ensures she’s clued in on the latest music and current affairs.
It helps her find common ground with her passengers. She learns a lot from them too.
“I got a recipe for beer from one,” she tells us excitedly.
Her phone has been unusually silent and we decide to drive around the area. She shows us her Uber app, there are four other cars in the area.
“You’ve got to be sneaky and clever to get requests,” she says cheekily.
An alert goes off on her phone and we’re off to pick up her first customer, in Bryanston.
Our first rider tells us of his amusing Uber mishaps as we drive to the upmarket Sandton City mall. He had once drunkenly requested an Uber van, which seats six and is used for larger groups, only to be greeted by a very confused driver looking for the rest of the passengers. We drop him off and Mashao jokingly tells him not to make the same mistake tonight.
We head to Mashao’s usual Friday night spot at The Waterford Shopping Centre in Fourways. As we pull into the center, a request goes off on her phone and we’re on the move again.
It’s 6PM and we pick up a teacher on his way to a school play. He’s in high spirits after a long week. “It’s Friday night so I thought why not? Uber always has your back,” he says.
There’s a power cut and the area is dark but Mashao expertly maneuvers through the traffic.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="size-medium wp-image-30157 alignleft" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/Uber-driver-015-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Uber-driver-015-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Uber-driver-015-600x399.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Uber-driver-015-768x511.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Uber-driver-015.jpg 1024w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
The calm and collected Mashao says her scariest moment was picking up a passenger from a wedding at The Cradle of Humankind, a World Heritage Site located 50 kilometers northwest of Johannesburg. It was 2AM and the road to the venue was a dirt track.
The Uber app had alerted the passengers about the driver’s profile. Seeing that they had a female driver arriving to pick them up, they had a bouquet of flowers waiting for Mashao.
“It made it worth it,” she says.
We stop at a garage in Honeydew as she reapplies her lipstick land freshens up in the restroom. It’s the only break she has had. We’re in a quiet area and there are no alerts on her phone.
Its 7PM and we head to Melville, a bustling area cluttered with bars and restaurants.
She makes a sudden U-turn as she receives a request. We fetch two 12-year-olds on their first date. We get off as they get in.
They hold hands in the back seat and steal coy glances at each other. We agree to meet Mashao in Melville after she drops them off.
“Fridays are usually busy, you guys must be bad luck,” she says with a laugh. It has been quiet but every moment is an adventure for Mashao.
The night is still young, filled with umpteen possibilities.

Tag: Uber

FORBES AFRICA SOCIAL MEDIA