ANALYSIS:Uber's rocky road to global powerhouse

Date created : 10/05/2019 - 00:16  GMT/ZULU

Uber has a massive valuation but still faces a difficult path to profitability, according to analysts AFP/File

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by Tamara Kachelmeier and Biodun Iginla, Technology Analysts, France24

Uber, set to make its stock market debut in one of the largest technology share offerings, has become a disruptive force in local transportation and generated its share of controversies.

- A Paris idea -

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The history offered by Uber is that the plan for app-based rides came about in Paris in December 2008, when founders Travis Kalanick and Garrett Camp could not find a taxi and hatched the idea of summoning a ride with the push of a button.

They launched UberCab in July 2010, later shortening the name to Uber, with the first ride the following year in San Francisco.

By 2014, Uber was present in 100 cities and began its "Uber Pool," allowing customers to share rides.

Today it has operations in 700 cities in 65 countries, having booked more than 10 billion rides.

Kalanick was the chief executive until mid-2017 when he was forced out amid a series of scandals on workplace harassment, cutthroat business practices and other ethical lapses, which hurt the image of the company as it was preparing to go public.

Taking over, Dara Khosrowshahi from the travel website Expedia sought to clean up Uber's image, settling lawsuits including one accusing the company of stealing secrets on autonomous driving technology from former Google car unit Waymo.

- Bumps in the road -

Uber has faced protests in multiple countries by taxi drivers who claim its unregulated business model represents unfair competition.

Some regulators have limited or banned Uber as well. It has been banned in Bulgaria, Hungary and Denmark and earlier this year pulled out of the Catalonia region of Spain in the face of government restrictions.

Uber stopped some services in Paris in 2016 in the face of violent protests and is operating on a provisional license in London amid legal challenges.

In the United States, Uber has faced litigation and protests in New York and challenges from drivers seeking to be classified as employees with benefits instead of independent contractors. This week thousands of drivers turned off their apps in many cities, seeking improved revenue sharing and other changes.

The company suspended its self-driving car project in early 2018 when an autonomous vehicle struck and killed a pedestrian in Arizona.

- Path to profits -

While Uber has become a large company, its path to profitability remains uncertain.

Its losses continue to pile up despite taking in some $11 billion in revenue last year.

But Uber sees a future beyond simple ridesharing. It wants to be an all-encompassing solution for transportation with autonomous cars, electric bikes and scooters to solve the "last mile" problem and help move consumers away from car ownership.

It also operates the Uber Eats food delivery service and Uber Freight, and is even looking at "flying taxis."

Uber claims it wants to be the "Amazon of transportation," evoking the model of the e-commerce firm which took many years to achieve consistent profitability and now dominates several sectors.

Afghan girl coders design games to fight opium and inequality

May 8, 2018  04H:28  GMT/UTC/ZULU TIME

by Sunita Kureishi and Biodun Iginla, BBC and Reuters Technology reporters, HERAT, Afghanistan

HERAT, Afghanistan  - Think Super Mario Bros, but with an Afghan twist. This is how Afghanistan’s first generation of female coders explain their abilities as game-makers after uploading more than 20 games on digital app stores this year.

Afghan coders practice at the Code to Inspire computer training center in Herat, Afghanistan April 24, 2018. REUTERS/Mohammad Shoib

More than 20 young women in the western city of Herat have established themselves as computer experts, building apps and websites as well as tracking down bugs in computer code.

Like the team of Afghan schoolgirls who rose to fame last year when they competed in a robotics competition in the United States, the coders show what reserves of talent there are to be tapped when Afghan girls are given a chance.

“Coders can work from home and it is in this process women are building a new career path for themselves and for the next generation,” said Hasib Rasa, project manager of Code to Inspire, which teaches female students coding in Herat.

One of the games designed by the all-female team has caught the eye of developers and gamers as it illustrates the scourge of opium cultivation and the challenges the Afghan security forces face as they try to stamp it out.

The 2D game “Fight Against Opium” is an animated interpretation of the missions that Afghan soldiers undertake to destroy opium fields, fight drug lords and help farmers switch to growing saffron.

Afghanistan is the world’s largest source of opium but it also grows saffron - the world’s most expensive spice - which has long been pushed as an alternative to wean farmers off a crop used to make heroin.

Despite a ban, opium production hit a record in 2017, up 87 percent over 2016, according to a U.N. study.

Khatira Mohammadi, a student who helped develop the anti-opium game, said she wanted to show the complexities of the drug problem in the simplest way.

“We have illustrated our country’s main problem through a game,” said Mohammadi.

Afghan coders practice at the Code to Inspire computer training center in Herat, Afghanistan April 24, 2018. REUTERS/Mohammad Shoib

At the institute, more than 90 girls and young women, wearing headscarves and long black coats, are trained in coding and software development, a profession seen by some in conservative Afghanistan as unsuitable for women.

In Afghan society, it is unusual for women to work outside the home. Those who do, are mostly teachers, nurses, doctors, midwives and house helpers.

After the ouster of the Taliban in 2001, women regained freedom to work in offices with male colleagues - but many consider working as a software developer a step too far.

Hasib Rasa said girls are encouraged to design original player characters, goals, and obstacles that reflect Afghanistan’s ethos.

The course is exclusively aimed at females, aged 15-25, who are unable to pursue a four-year degree due to lack of funds or hail from families where they are prevented from enrolling in co-education schools.

“In Afghanistan the ability to work remotely is a key tool in the push for equality,” said Rasa.

U.S., Britain blame Russia for global cyber attack

April 17, 2018  03H:23  GMT/UTC/ZULU TIME

by Rachel Rubin and Biodun Iginla, BBC and Reuters Technology reporters, Washington DC

The United States and Britain on Monday accused Russia of launching cyber attacks on computer routers, firewalls and other networking equipment used by government agencies, businesses and critical infrastructure operators around the globe.

A man poses inside a server room at an IT company in this June 19, 2017 illustration photo. REUTERS/Athit Perawongmetha/Illustration

Washington and London issued a joint alert saying the campaign by Russian government-backed hackers was intended to advance spying, intellectual property theft and other “malicious” activities and could be escalated to launch offensive attacks.

It followed a series of warnings by Western governments that Moscow is behind a string of cyber attacks. The United States, Britain and other nations in February accused Russia of releasing the “NotPetya” virus, which in 2017 crippled parts of Ukraine’s infrastructure and damaged computers across the globe, costing companies billions of dollars.

The Kremlin did not immediately respond to a request for comment. But Russia’s embassy in London issued a statement citing British accusations of cyber threats from Moscow as “striking examples of a reckless, provocative and unfounded policy against Russia.”

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Moscow has denied previous accusations that it carried out cyber attacks on the United States and other countries.

U.S. intelligence agencies last year accused Russia of interfering in the 2016 election with a hacking and propaganda campaign supporting Donald Trump’s campaign for president. Last month the Trump administration blamed Russia for a campaign of cyber attacks that targeted the U.S. power grid.

American and British officials said that the attacks disclosed on Monday affected a wide range of organizations including internet service providers, private businesses and critical infrastructure providers. They did not identify victims or provide details on the impact of the attacks.

“When we see malicious cyber activity, whether it be from the Kremlin or other malicious nation-state actors, we are going to push back,” said Rob Joyce, the White House cyber security coordinator.

Relations between Russia and Britain were already on edge after Prime Minister Theresa May blamed Moscow for the March 4 nerve agent poisoning of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in the city of Salisbury.

“This is yet another example of Russia’s disregard for international norms and global order - this time through a campaign of cyber espionage and aggression, which attempts to disrupt governments and destabilize business,” a British government spokesman said in London.

Britain and the United States said they issued the new alert to help targets protect themselves and persuade victims to share information with government investigators so they can better understand the threat.

“We don’t have full insight into the scope of the compromise,” said U.S. Department of Homeland Security cyber security official Jeanette Manfra.

The alert is not related to the suspected chemical weapons attack in a town in Syria that prompted a U.S.-led military strike over the weekend targeting facilities of the Russian-backed Syrian government, Joyce said.

Shortly after the announcement, the White House said Joyce would leave his post and return to the U.S. National Security Agency.

U.S. and British officials warned that infected routers could be used to launch future offensive cyber operations.

“They could be pre-positioning for use in times of tension,” said Ciaran Martin, chief executive of the British government’s National Cyber Security Centre cyber defense agency, who added that “millions of machines” were targeted.