Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news, back.
Speaker 2: To Tech earnings shares of Lyft higher. The company reported
Speaker 2: growing demand for premium rides, also strengthening European markets. Super
Speaker 2: interesting and kind of the global expansion story, Lift CEO
Speaker 2: David Risher is with us. There is a very specific
Speaker 2: data point actually that I'd like to start on, and
Speaker 2: that is that in markets, specifically San Francisco where you
Speaker 2: have Lyft rides and Weimo rides, you said San Francisco
Speaker 2: grew twenty percent year on year.
Speaker 1: That's right.
Speaker 2: I explain the causal or casual relationship within that data point.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So you know, our industry has gone through a
Speaker 1: big transformation and it is the sort of bringing on
Speaker 1: of these self driving vehicles. Waymore of course is the
Speaker 1: market leader in that anytime you see a transformation like this,
Speaker 1: one or two things can happen. You can either see
Speaker 1: sort of a substitution or you can see a market expansion,
Speaker 1: and in this case, we're seeing a market expansion. And
Speaker 1: it's not that's surprising. When people take self driving cars,
Speaker 1: they tend to like them a lot. They're very reliable product,
Speaker 1: They're a nice private product. So you feel like you
Speaker 1: could have a private conversation. But at the same time
Speaker 1: it doesn't seem to take away from people's interest in
Speaker 1: being driven by humans who can help with luggage or
Speaker 1: have good conversations. So it really is a creative.
Speaker 2: This is a micro case study. It's one market San Francisco.
Speaker 2: But you know, the questions are is Lift gaining market
Speaker 2: share from Weimo in this city or is it that
Speaker 2: this is an issue of supply So because somebody cannot
Speaker 2: get into a Weimo within a reasonable timeframe, they go
Speaker 2: to the lift app, which is happening. I probably both, honestly,
Speaker 2: probably so interesting.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I think this is such an interesting thing
Speaker 1: that's going to play out. My expectation over time is
Speaker 1: what will dominate will be the market expansion. And again,
Speaker 1: the reason it's sort of simple. You have a cool
Speaker 1: new product coming onto an existing platform, and where we
Speaker 1: believe the hybrid network, which is you know, human driven
Speaker 1: cars plus avs really kind of creates the best possborll
Speaker 1: come for everyone. But well, you know, we'll I'll have
Speaker 1: to see how that works.
Speaker 2: I think that you and I discussed on several occasions
Speaker 2: the idea that the introduction of the robot taxi and
Speaker 2: maturity of the market expands the overall tam for ride haling.
Speaker 2: Just recap that argument.
Speaker 1: I think that's exactly it. So, I mean, look, people
Speaker 1: take just in the United States, about one hundred and
Speaker 1: sixty billion rides a year in their private cars. Okay,
Speaker 1: today we deliver a billion. Maybe the other guy's deliver
Speaker 1: two billions. So it's called that three billion out of
Speaker 1: one hundred and sixty billion. And it's a good experience.
Speaker 1: You're sitting in the backseat, you're able to text, you're
Speaker 1: able to have your own space. What holds it back, Well,
Speaker 1: for whatever reason, some people might want not want to
Speaker 1: be driven by another driver or someone else in the car.
Speaker 1: This takes that away. I'll tell you a very specific story.
Speaker 1: So I was just with an old friend of mine.
Speaker 1: I just ran intrew into the airport. Her son had
Speaker 1: a tragic, tragic accent a couple of years ago, absolutely
Speaker 1: devastating physical accident. He's in rehabilitation. For him. The idea
Speaker 1: of getting in a self driving car where the doors
Speaker 1: open wide, maybe there's not even a driver there, not
Speaker 1: there's anything wrong with that, but it just gives him
Speaker 1: more space to sort of be in his own zone is.
Speaker 2: Actually going to be the technology and an engineering story,
Speaker 2: design story.
Speaker 1: It's a design story exactly. And so anyway, I'm very
Speaker 1: optimistic about this. And then when I look at our
Speaker 1: capabilities around fleet management and you know, kind of imagining
Speaker 1: supply and demand, I get really excited about the future.
Speaker 2: LIFT is let's let's go back to the core business
Speaker 2: and the earnings. But LIFT is pushing outside of the
Speaker 2: United States. You know, every time you've been on the
Speaker 2: show over the last year, there's been a development on
Speaker 2: that front. But what do we actually learn through your
Speaker 2: earnings about how you're growing x USA?
Speaker 1: So here's what's really cool. So LIFT was primarily a
Speaker 1: domestic company up until about a year ago, maybe called
Speaker 1: it eighteen months ago. Then we started to expand in Canada.
Speaker 1: That's gone very well. Now we acquired a company called
Speaker 1: free Now and a couple of other smaller companies overseas. Okay,
Speaker 1: what's happened since then. We're in the process of transforming
Speaker 1: ourself to a truly global company. Some of that is
Speaker 1: internal stuff, back of the house, multi currency, GDPR, all
Speaker 1: these sorts of things, but we're also beginning to introduce
Speaker 1: new functionality to customers. So I was just in Barcelona
Speaker 1: a couple of weeks ago. I was very lucky to
Speaker 1: be there. I get a chance to check out on
Speaker 1: our beta app, the ability to use the Lift app,
Speaker 1: not a new app, but the Lift app to hail
Speaker 1: local supply local taxicab in Barcelona. I did it four times,
Speaker 1: work flawlessly, So good because I don't have to do
Speaker 1: a different app. I already know the user interface and
Speaker 1: so forth, and sowe for now the company we required,
Speaker 1: they're also growing now too because of some of the
Speaker 1: innovation of the technology we've been able to add to
Speaker 1: their stack. So it's look, our service levels are really
Speaker 1: good and I love that about our product, and now
Speaker 1: we can take that to a more global audience and
Speaker 1: hopefully continue to grow as a result.
Speaker 2: How we let you know, it could be Europe Spain specifically,
Speaker 2: but how are those markets different to the United States?
Speaker 2: How does the consumer behave differently? You know there are.
Speaker 1: Subtle differences, I mean very significant, I guess difference not subtle.
Speaker 1: Is the role of the taxicab in a lot of
Speaker 1: Europe is very significant.
Speaker 2: You know, this culturally entrenched in many economies in Europe,
Speaker 2: as an example.
Speaker 1: Very much so. And unlike maybe in a New York
Speaker 1: where people almost begrudgingly take a cab, for example, But
Speaker 1: in a.
Speaker 2: Plays like Spain, and you're going to have New york
Speaker 2: Is phony into this program now.
Speaker 1: And I get that, and I understand well, and New
Speaker 1: Yorkers have opinions about their taxicabs, right, But in Spain
Speaker 1: it tends to be almost a career. You know, you
Speaker 1: get in the car, it's probably someone who's been doing
Speaker 1: it for many years, maybe as father did it as well.
Speaker 1: Certainly in London everyone knows that knowledge. I mean, it's
Speaker 1: an all sort of incredible thing. So that's a really
Speaker 1: significant difference. And for us, it favors us because free
Speaker 1: now is strong in taxis and the sort of double
Speaker 1: click there is because tax is seen to be quite regulated.
Speaker 1: The relationship that that company and now our company has
Speaker 1: with governments tends to be quite strong, which back to
Speaker 1: the av question, really matters a lot. Abe is new
Speaker 1: technology and for a lot of governments it feels maybe
Speaker 1: a little bit intimidating, and we can help there. So
Speaker 1: it's a really nice sort of set of circumstances that
Speaker 1: tends to sort of favor our business.
Speaker 2: In markets outside of the United States, Uber is already
Speaker 2: there in some cases, Bolt etc. How are you going
Speaker 2: to make lifts different from a technology perspective or just
Speaker 2: a product perspective.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so stay tuned on this. This is actually a
Speaker 1: very very live conversation we're having internally. I can use
Speaker 1: some of the examples of the US maybe and give
Speaker 1: you a little sense. So in the US we've really
Speaker 1: redoubled our innovation and you know some of these products
Speaker 1: Women plus Connect and I just turned that we've given
Speaker 1: over one hundred and seventy five million rides between women
Speaker 1: and women in the US over the last couple of years.
Speaker 1: Lift Teens, Lift Silver. This is real innovation. We're hoping
Speaker 1: to bring some of that innovation to the European space
Speaker 1: for sure. And then there's also a lot of conversation
Speaker 1: around you know, let's say, the reputation of those guys
Speaker 1: in Europe isn't necessarily super. People don't necessarily love the company.
Speaker 1: I'll just say it that way, and we hope we
Speaker 1: bring some joy to the conversation as well.
Speaker 2: Internally, Where is your biggest focus on the technology side,
Speaker 2: What are the types of people you're trying to bring
Speaker 2: in and things you're building rebuilding, code migration, literally anything
Speaker 2: on the side.
Speaker 1: For sure. So many interesting things. So I'll give you
Speaker 1: a couple of examples. Some of it's basic, some of
Speaker 1: it's more far reaching. Here's the basic thing. We now
Speaker 1: pick people up on average, so seventy five percent of
Speaker 1: the time we will pick you up either the same
Speaker 1: or faster than our big competitor. OK. Why is that
Speaker 1: kind of a big deal? Because our market share is smaller.
Speaker 1: So doing that reliably twenty four hours a day, seventy
Speaker 1: a week because people are busy, they want to get
Speaker 1: to where they are an awesome accomplishment. I'm hugely proud
Speaker 1: of our marketplace team for accomplishing that. And then, bigger picture,
Speaker 1: I'm really excited about Lifting, one of our newest products
Speaker 1: that allows teens to get in and get constant messaging
Speaker 1: back to their parents to make sure the parents know
Speaker 1: that they're safe and sound. It's just a good I
Speaker 1: look at this as almost a generational thing. A new
Speaker 1: car now costs like eight indred bucks. It's going to
Speaker 1: be interred bucks a month, fifty on releasepace plus maintenance,
Speaker 1: plus gas, all these sorts of things. Lift is just
Speaker 1: a better answer for a lot of people. And so
Speaker 1: I'm sort of excited when I look two, three, four,
Speaker 1: five years out at some of the kind of you know,
Speaker 1: teen innovation now, because I think that'll help change a
Speaker 2: Whole generation lift CEO David Rishard, thank you very much
Speaker 2: for coming in than thanks for being back on the show.