TechCrunch reports that Uber is acquiring imaging/mapping assets and talent from Microsoft's Bing search engine division:
Uber will acquire assets from Microsoft Bing, including roughly 100 employees focused on the product's image collection activities. In short, Uber is absorbing data-collection engineers from Microsoft to bolster its own mapping work. The companies confirmed the transaction with TechCrunch, but each declined to name the terms of the agreement. Microsoft handing Uber part of its operating expenses is minor, given the financial scale of the firms. The technology transfer is far more interesting.
The move also underscores Uber's ambition. A firm doesn't hire 100 specific-focus engineers in a single move if it doesn't have large product aspirations. The new Uber kids are the folks who worked to get image data into Bing, meaning that the search engine's 3D, aerial and street footage is in large part their doing. You can therefore start to presume what Uber has in mind.
The deal continues a recent Uber splurge on mapping technology:
Although most Uber services rely on digital maps, much of its interest in mapping is focused on how to improve its carpooling service, UberPool. While Uber relies heavily on mapping technology from Apple, Baidu and especially Google, the company has taken strides to bring as much mapping expertise in-house as possible.
In March, Uber acquired deCarta, a mapping technology start-up. Uber has also aggressively pursued mapping engineering talent throughout Silicon Valley. And for months, Uber has been avidly competing to buy Nokia Here, the mapping division of the Finnish technology giant, in a deal that could be valued at up to $4 billion, according to several people with direct knowledge of the matter. A small number of bidders are still circling Nokia's business, according to these people, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the negotiations were not public.
In other news, two Uber managers were arrested in France and questioned over the firm's ongoing "illicit activity," following protests by taxi drivers and the ban of UberPOP by France's interior minister.
Original Submission
Related Stories
A new round of funding has increased Uber's valuation to around $51 billion. The New York Times cites anonymous sources in reporting that Microsoft contributed about $1 billion, "a substantial amount of the financing." As you may remember, Uber recently acquired mapping assets and talent from Microsoft's Bing search engine division. Microsoft's participation in the latest funding round may indicate a "strategic alliance" between the company and Uber.
Uber needs all the billions it can get its hands on. It has followed June's announcement of $1 billion of investment to expand in China with a new $1 billion bet - this time to expand Uber India. Uber was recently banned in Delhi after a driver allegedly raped a female passenger. The company resumed operations in January anyway, and an Indian court lifted the ban on July 8.
Uber will face tough competition in India; existing firm Ola reportedly operates twice as many daily rides as Uber in over 100 cities, and is being valued at a measly $2.4 billion.
French taxi drivers are the latest to protest the entry of Uber into their protected market. Their protests feature vandalism and blocking roads. From the AP story:
French taxi drivers pulled out the throttle in an all-out confrontation with the ultra-cheap Uber car service Thursday, smashing livery cars, setting tires ablaze and blocking traffic during a nationwide strike that caught tourists and celebrities alike in the mayhem.
[...] Taxi drivers justified their rage, saying Uber's lowest-cost service UberPop was ruining their livihoods.[sic]
[...] Anger seethed across France, with riot police chasing strikers from Paris' ring road, where protesters torched tires and swarmed onto exit ramps during rush hour on the busy artery that leads to Charles de Gaulle airport. In Toulouse in the southwest, angry taxi drivers dumped flour onto UberPop cars, tires were burned in Nantes in the west, and in Lyon, in the southeast, roads were blocked.
Compare this to Uber protests in London.
Vive le monopole!
Original Submission
Hot on the heels of Microsoft handing over Bing imaging assets and employees to Uber, AOL has announced a partnership and deal that will see it take over sales and management of online advertisements on Microsoft Web properties:
The deal, which was announced on Monday (US time), will see AOL take over ads for such sites as MSN Homepage, Outlook.com, Skype, Xbox, and ads in apps. Markets affected include the US, UK, Canada, Brazil, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, and Spain. "The arrangement will improve ad campaign efficiency and effectiveness through the delivery of scaled premium inventory across display, video and mobile, and enables marketers to deeply target premium audiences globally in key verticals, including autos, entertainment, health & fitness, lifestyle, money, news, sports, travel, and weather," AOL gushed in a canned statement.
The partnership also includes a new ten-year arrangement in which the AOL portal will switch its search engine to Bing from January 1, 2016, while AOL will sell and manage ads both on its own search site and on Microsoft's. "This deal is further evidence of the quality of Bing results and the performance of the Bing Ads marketplace," Microsoft corporate veep Rik van der Kooi said in a statement. "And we will continue our focus on delivering world class consumer services and content and look forward to partnering with AOL to market them."
Online ads have never been a massive business for Microsoft. Compared to its rival Google, which earns in excess of 90 per cent of its revenue from its various ad businesses, Microsoft tucks its online ad sales into its "Devices and Consumer Other" reporting segment, which itself accounts for only about a tenth of the software giant's revenue.
Original Submission
BBC writes that German carmakers Audi, BMW and Daimler are buying Nokia's "Here" maps business for €2.8bn (£2bn):
"High-precision digital maps are a crucial component of the mobility of the future," said Dieter Zetsche, chairman of the board of Daimler. The carmakers plan to use Here's technology to combine precise digital maps with real-time vehicle data more closely. "For the automotive industry, this is the basis for new assistance systems and ultimately fully autonomous driving," the automakers said in a statement.
The rival automakers each plan to hold an equal stake in Here. The company said vehicle manufacturers are sharing data to make real-time map updates a reality.
Perhaps it's also worth mentioning that Nokia bought Navteq in 2007 for €5.7bn.
takyon: Nokia Intends to Buy Alcatel-Lucent
BMW, Audi, and Mercedes Want to Buy Nokia's Here Mapping Group
Uber Acquires Mapping Assets and Employees From Microsoft/Bing
(Score: 2) by frojack on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:25AM
Seriously, this looks beyond Uber. They have exactly one trick, an app that gets you a car. Maps are already on every driver's phone, and every passenger's phone. They seem to have a global reach. That's impressive, but not on THIS scale.
This has got to be one of the biggest stealth moves I've seen in years, and I think there is just way more going on here than people earning money driving someone else around in their car. I'm beginning to suspect Microsoft may have been bankrolling this all along.
Ok, ok, I'm stepping away from the tinfoil. Nobody's going to get hurt. sorry. Meds... going.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday June 30 2015, @05:10AM
Uber wants another trick: replacing their drivers with driverless cars.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 4, Funny) by captain normal on Tuesday June 30 2015, @05:45AM
Most likely it's because they see they can no longer depend on Google maps for decent routing because Larry and Sergey have turned the whole operation over to scriptkiddies on ecstasy binges.
The Musk/Trump interview appears to have been hacked, but not a DDOS hack...more like A Distributed Denial of Reality.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Tuesday June 30 2015, @06:01AM
I dono, Google routing is pretty good, certainly better than starting your own mapping company from scratch.
There are about 5 companies lining up to pick the bones of Nokia's mapping service (Here) [here.com].
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by TheRaven on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:57PM
sudo mod me up
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday June 30 2015, @07:34AM
How come? Uber has only $470mil in operating loses [bloomberg.com], it really can do better: just look at Twitter.
https://www.youtube.com/@ProfSteveKeen https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by Rich on Tuesday June 30 2015, @10:42AM
May it be that they have plainly too much money? From http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/11/technology/uber-valuation-highlights-the-speedy-pace-of-investments.html [nytimes.com] and a linked article, I read that the stakes are around $3bn now, and, "double up or quit", looking into raising their bet to $4.5bn. That's a big pile of cash for a little ride sharing app. The NYT article also hints that $1.5bn of investment are supposed to return $50bn these days - at least for the "big name" investors mentioned :)
My personal imagination about what is going on there is roughly:
Investor: No one honors money with good interest anymore. And we've got too much of it. Let's make more anyway. Present a simple business idea of something everyone needs every day.
Entrepreneur: Electricity? Ride the renewables wave? Music? Everyone listens to music.
Investor: Nah. Utilities are commodity. No return. And no one matches Apple with anything media.
Entrepreneur: Personal transport? Everyone needs to go around every day.
Investor: Yea. Sounds good. The monopoly structure even has lots of profit to milk off. Here's a wad of cash. Buy every opinion and every vote you need. Just outspend the little fiefdoms. We'll recover that later when they play by our rules.
Entrepreneur: Er, sorry, we blew two billion on bribes and opinion leaders but the stupid fiefdoms don't go away.
Investor: Then FUCKING DO SOMETHING! We're big money and we don't like write-offs.
I haven't looked deep into the investor structure, but, as you say, it may well be that "Investor" above is Microsoft for a good part and they may seek synergies beyond pure ROI. Eventually they've got to score something huge again, or they will end up in trouble.
(Score: 2) by n1 on Tuesday June 30 2015, @12:48PM
I don't know the grand strategy Uber is working on, but i think there's a comment worth considering when reading most Uber stories.
As reported by Forbes [forbes.com]:
A CEO of a company that relies pretty much exclusively on private car ownership on it's first phase of development, wishes to make it a thing of the past in the longer-term. The larger picture, on how they will get from where they are now, to where they want to be, may become more clear in time. I'm sure this is just one step on the road to that end goal.
(Score: 1) by m2o2r2g2 on Wednesday July 01 2015, @01:36AM
no need for tinfoil hats. The explanation is easy. They have big ambitions in the self driving car space. This has been covered in detail a lot of times on this site. Self driving cars need image processing and good map data. Hiring imaging and mapping engineers is a good step toward getting that.
http://www.theverge.com/2015/5/22/8643047/uber-self-driving-car-first-pictures [theverge.com]
from the above link:
"This is not a self-driving test car," said an Uber spokesperson in a statement given to The Verge. "This vehicle is part of our early research efforts regarding mapping, safety and autonomy systems."
(Score: 2) by bootsy on Tuesday June 30 2015, @08:16AM
I can't believe I am typing this but I have to admit the Bing MAPS API for use in .Net GUIs is really very good. Most large corporations already have a site wide MS License so they can plug it into their applications at no cost ( yes terms can change but as far as commercial software licenses go it is just mildy evil ).
We wrote an in house application that allowed you to zoom in on a map of the US and graphically view mortgage arrears and default rates. It worked brilliantly, was very intuitve and fast. Bing Maps was really good, okay it lacked the street view killer feature of Google but when you used it MS actually lost money on it.
Bing Maps is a decent bit of software and data that is losing MS money in its fight with Google. I can see why the would wish to divulge it to a non search based company.
Disclaimer: I stopped using Google a while back when I started to not get the same results as other people. I used Bing for a few years and MS lost money each time I used it. I now mainly use duck duck go.