At a time when ‘taking the knee’ is trending, Uber has been bending its knee—not in political protest but in humility. New CEO Dara Khosrowshahi has been humbled after the Transport for London (TfL) agency said it won’t renew its license at the end of September because the company is not “fit and proper” to operate in the city.
Citing Uber’s past failures to report serious crimes and its “Greyball” software that prevents officials from monitoring Uber’s app, the TfL said Uber’s “approach and conduct demonstrate a lack of corporate responsibility in relation to a number of issues which have potential public safety and security implications.”
The safety & security of Londoners must come first: my @guardian piece on @TfL's decision about Uber https://t.co/YtIbeTDUYp
— Sadiq Khan (@SadiqKhan) September 24, 2017
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London Mayor Sadiq Khan (who’s also standing up to the White House these days) is supporting TfL in its legal battle against Uber on the grounds of protecting safety, stating in an op-ed column in The Guardian that, “All companies in London must play by the rules and adhere to the high standards we expect — particularly when it comes to the safety of customers. Providing an innovative service must not be at the expense of customer safety and security.”
Drivers who use Uber in London are licensed by TfL and have been through the same enhanced DBS background checks as black cab drivers.
— Uber (@Uber) September 24, 2017
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Uber has been operating in London since 2012, and its aggressive expansion has created a culture lax on security and passenger safety since launch. While the company defended its background checks as comparable to London’s famed black cab drivers, CEO Dara Khosrowshahi also apologized to Londoners, acknowledging the company “got things wrong.”
Dear London: we r far from perfect but we have 40k licensed drivers and 3.5mm Londoners depending on us. Pls work w/us to make things right
— dara khosrowshahi (@dkhos) September 22, 2017
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You have my commitment that @Uber will work with #London to make things right and keep this great global city moving safely. pic.twitter.com/MZbDS6fYQL
— dara khosrowshahi (@dkhos) September 25, 2017
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In an open letter to the city, he pledged to listen to London’s as he scripts the company’s future. “While Uber has revolutionized the way people move in cities around the world, it’s equally true that we’ve got things wrong along the way,” Dara Khosrowshahi wrote in a letter first published in London’s The Evening Standard and then shared on Twitter. “On behalf of everyone at Uber globally, I apologize for the mistakes we’ve made.”
Khosrowshahi took over as Uber’s top exec last month following Travis Kalanick’s departure amidst a PR crisis about allegations that managers were neither addressing nor reporting claims of sexual harassment.
Khosrowshahi says he’s committed “to help Uber write its next chapter. We won’t be perfect, but we will listen to you; we will look to be long-term partners with the cities we serve; and we will run our business with humility, integrity and passion.”
Uber’s 40,000 London drivers represent one-third of the city’s total number of private-hire vehicles, and they will continue to pick-up passengers during a planned (and lengthy) appeals process.
In a separate letter Khosrowshahi sent to Uber employees on Friday, he wrote that “it’s worth examining how we got here,” and that “the truth is that there is a high cost to a bad reputation.”
Uber will challenge the TfL decision in court and started a petition urging Khan to keep Uber in the city. By Monday, more than 760,000 people had signed.
The San Francisco-based Uber is backed by Goldman Sachs and BlackRock, and Khan said, “I appreciate Uber has an army of lawyers, they’ve also made aggressive threats about taking us to court and the rest of it.” However, he added: “You can’t have it both ways: on the one hand acting in an aggressive manner for all sorts of things but on the other hand brief to journalists that they want to do a deal with TfL.”
The company has faced regulatory and legal setbacks worldwide and been forced to leave other countries including Denmark and Hungary. Italy briefly blocked Uber, citing unfair competition, while it was barred from operating in Taiwan for two months earlier this year.
Clearly, there’s bad blood dating back to founding CEO Kalanick, who stated in 2012, “Competition is good…. You have to be a fighter, kind of be a warrior. If not, you should go do something that’s a little less disruptive. Don’t underestimate the power that efficiency and elegance of experience can have on a stagnant market.”
Uber disrupted an industry and created a new vortex of mobile, car transport and logistics, but as with every disruption, cultural and regulatory reverberations ensue. The Battle of Britain could prove to be Uber’s defining moment—and it has until October 14 to formally appeal TfL’s decision and avoid a world war.
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