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The New York Times reports:
Travis Kalanick stepped down Tuesday as chief executive of Uber, the ride-hailing service that he helped found in 2009 and built into a transportation colossus, after a shareholder revolt made it untenable for him to stay on at the company.
Mr. Kalanick's exit came under pressure after hours of drama involving Uber's investors, according to two people with knowledge of the situation, who asked to remain anonymous because the details were confidential.
Earlier on Tuesday, five of Uber's major investors demanded that the chief executive resign immediately. The investors included one of Uber's biggest shareholders, the venture capital firm Benchmark, which has one of its partners, Bill Gurley, on Uber's board. The investors made their demand for Mr. Kalanick to step down in a letter delivered to the chief executive while he was in Chicago, said the people with knowledge of the situation.
[...] Mr. Kalanick's troubles began earlier this year after a former Uber engineer detailed what she said was sexual harassment at the company, opening the floodgates for more complaints and spurring internal investigations. In addition, Uber has been dealing with an intellectual property lawsuit from Waymo, the self-driving car business that operates under Google's parent company, and a federal inquiry into a software tool that Uber used to sidestep some law enforcement.
Uber has been trying to move past its difficult history, which has grown inextricably tied to Mr. Kalanick. In recent months, Uber has fired more than 20 employees after an investigation into the company's culture, embarked on major changes to professionalize its workplace, and is searching for new executives including a chief operating officer.
According to The Register:
Kalanick led Uber into fights on many fronts. The company had a strategy of entering markets without regard to regulation, earning it lawsuits all over the world. During one such lawsuit, Uber breached privacy laws. The company also stands accused of stealing self-driving car technology and deliberately targeting government officials who sought to investigate it.
The BBC notes:
Surely the most dramatic fall from grace the start-up world has ever seen, a scalp so big it will have chief executives across this city sitting bolt upright, and thinking: "If Travis can get booted out of Uber... no-one is safe."
What started out as a PR inconvenience has left the company without, to name just a few, a chief executive officer, chief operating officer, chief technology officer and chief financial officer. Uber is in tatters, engulfed by its own aggression.
Mr Kalanick embodied his company's prevailing attitude: success at all costs. It saw Uber dominate the ride-sharing world, his chutzpah enabling the company to attract investment so effectively that last year Uber alone raised more money than the entire UK start-up scene.
But in doing so he didn't play fair. He created a company that deceived local regulators, neglected the well-being of employees, wound-up drivers, troubled investors, obtained a rape victim's medical records and allegedly stole trade secrets from a rival.
See also: c|net
(Score: 4, Interesting) by jmorris on Wednesday June 21 2017, @03:24PM (4 children)
The guy had to go, he talks about The Fountainhead and stuff. The Powers that Be are making sure that one company in each niche is SJW Converged and that it dominates. If he had hung tough and stayed they would have destroyed Uber and moved on to one of the similar companies who lose venture money for a business model. He understood the rules, popped his Golden Parachute and will launch another startup. We should assume that he knew what would happen when he let Party Stalwarts like Huffington and Eric Holder assume important positions. The SJWs know they create nothing so are willing to let creators create, so long as they are willing to surrender control once the companies they make get big. And they don't even care if the Libertarians keep sacks of cash when they get booted, it isn't about money, they do not want anyone having positions of power who aren't "Of the Body."
Now that they can safely pick Uber as the one winner, as a blessed company it can return to being rewarded for losing money and punished for reporting profits even beyond the IPO phase, they are pretty much assured they will be the only one surviving in the Internet dispatched taxi space. This is of course only possible with the #FakeMoney the FED is throwing around, but there is less of it now so who knows how much longer this game goes on.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @07:43PM
Randian dipshits own the US there is only one solution to them, forcable Gualting
(Score: 1, Troll) by cubancigar11 on Wednesday June 21 2017, @07:47PM (2 children)
Oh my... you paint a scary picture but I just so happen to believe in it. For what its worth, I thought cutting off the CEO of SJW aka Hillary would start getting us some results. It is more scary if Mr. Kalanick founds another company and continues to play the game, instead of changing the rules.
(Score: 1, Troll) by aristarchus on Wednesday June 21 2017, @10:16PM (1 child)
And if cubancigar12 can believe something, that means? That it is right-wing conspiracy theory Infowars type tripe? That cubancig has also read Fountainhead? That jmorris is certifiably insane? It is just so difficult to draw any rational inference from this!! What if cubancigarette just so happened not to believe in it? Would the consequences for the universe at large be any different? Stay on topic, Soylentils, or you may be spam modded! It was the stockholders that forced this, you know, capitalists? The ownership class? The ones that own the CEOs?
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Thursday June 22 2017, @06:04AM
Warned you, cubancigar13! Your post was inane, incoherent rambling that under the just previous standards for spam mods, would be spam. Fortunately for you, it no longer is. I, and many other Soylentils, have sacrificed ourselves so that you may have the right to post your totally unsubstantiated and inane opinions. Show some respect.