The second start of Uber

There is once one of the most successful startups in the world from a crisis of a crisis of Iranian descent

Uber Technologies headquarters in New York. Photo: vc.ru

Sexy harassment, billionth losses and accusations of the theft of new technology for Google-the last six months of Uber Technologies, an international company-developer of mobile taxi calls, does not crawl out of scandals. At the insistence of dissatisfied investors in June 2017, the Founder of CEO was left by the founder of the company Travis Kalanik, and in the last week of summer, Dara Khosrovshahi was appointed in his place, who had been fled with parents from the Iran’s revolution almost forty years ago.

Young and experienced

Many business analytics did not pay attention to the name of candidates for candidates for candidates for the post of head of the most popular taxi aggregator. She was lost against the backdrop of venerable businessmen, such as Jeff Immelt, Chairman of the Board of Directors of General Electrics, and Meg Vitman, Executive Director of Hewlett Packard Enterprise. Therefore, some American publications called this appointment “unexpected”, others “amazing”, others - in general “shocking”. But, carefully looking at, many media outlets admitted that the “dark horse” bet can be quite successful for the service.

The gift of Khosrovshahi goes to Uber from ExpeDia, the hotel and ticket booking service - he became its executive director in 2005, and over 12 years of its management, the company conducted, according to The Washington Post , giant expansion, entering the markets of 60 countries and absorbed part of the competitors. After the IPO, the company's shares increased in price by 35% per year, and this is despite the fact that the market has to be divided with other popular services - Priceline and Airbnb. ExpeDia is considered a profitable company and is estimated at $ 23 billion. The Uber loss, although the service is estimated today at $ 50 billion (according to Fortune magazine), amounted to $ 2.8 billion in 2016. In addition, the company has a rather large debt - $ 1.1 million fines for drunken drivers .

On August 30, at the first meeting with Uber employees, the new CEO said that he plans to bring the company to an IPO over the next three years.

ExpeDia headquarters, which is leaving the businessman, is located in the city of Belveu (Washington). That is, for the silicone valley of Khosrovshahi - a stranger, emphasizes The New York Times. But he has another important advantage, writes The Washington Post: a gift, although a successful businessman, is still not so famous as to immediately close in his office from employees and become inaccessible to communication. Under Kalanik, it was not possible to reach some managers, which created, according to former employees, a poisonous atmosphere in the office. Therefore, the availability of a new boss will help change the relationship within the company and update the corporate culture, especially after scandals with sexual harassment and manifestations of sexism, as a result of which 20 employees of different levels were dismissed. Because of these scandals, among other things, Kalanik also went on an unlimited vacation.

Uber loss, although the service is estimated today at $ 50 billion (according to Fortune magazine), in 2016 amounted to $ 2.8 billion. In addition, the company hangs a rather large debt - $ 1.1 million fines for drunken drivers

The Washigton Post also observes another important characteristic of Khosrovshahi, which cannot but like in the Silicon Valley: the new Uber chief is 48 years old. According to American concepts, he is still considered a young executive director, albeit not as young as Mark Zuckerberg. But youth and experience are a successful combination for those types of business, whose final product is bought by large part customers aged 20 to 40 years. It seems that it is they who and the next generation of the most behind them who hope and believe in the development and speedy implementation of the “car without a driver” technology, which has become the subject of a dispute between Uber and Waymo (Google division). The latter accused the taxi aggregator of the theft of know-how by luring to her work-developers of the future technology. And this conflict is now also to be resolved by Khosrovshahi.

*Dara Khosrovshahi. *Photo: Flickr.com

Create yourself again

“The Savior of Uber”-and many people call Khosrovshah with hope-the businessman of Iranian descent, perhaps the determination and ambition of the migrant, albeit who came to America at the age of 9, will help to become. His family of wealthy industrialists was forced to leave Iran in 1978, when, as a result of the Islamic Revolution ( January 1978 - February 1979. - NT), the government of Shah Mohammed Razza Pahlavi fell. “We lost everything, our entire business had to give in to the new leadership,” recalls in an interview with The New York Times the cousin of Khosrovshahi Hadi Partovi. “But we had a strong desire to create ourselves again, to become businessmen.” And they succeeded. Partovi himself at an early stage became a shareholder of Facebook, Dropbox and Airbnb. In time, their other brothers and cousins ​​invested in startups.

Khosrovshahi himself admitted to Bloomberg Businessweek that the move was difficult for his parents, not like the children. In addition, his father Asgar (in America is just Gary) still failed to avoid the Iranian prison: he was concluded when he returned to visit a seriously ill brother. While my father was in custody for six years, Lily’s mother raised her children. All the same Partovich recalls that "mom taught them to be open with people." “Of course, the largest challenge in the life of Khosrovshahi, like all of us, was, in fact, the move to the USA itself and the need to assimilate in a new country. And living in the Iranians in America 1980-X was not so easy, especially when people sang “bombs, bombs, bombs for Iran,” said the cousin of the new CEO Uber. Like many children of migrants, the parents also “spurred” the gifts to the achievements: they were proud of his successes, but also harshly criticized the failures. However, this is happening now, when the son of Lily and Gary has already become a successful businessman - by the way, the highest paid manager in America. So last year the Khosrovshahs half a joke, half seriously complained about his twitter: “Mom said:“ Fine, you got into the TOP-100! ” Dad: “39th place, of course, is not bad, but in 2015 you were on the 11th!” ( This refers to the rating of the Glassdoor site, on which, including the former ones, are anonymously evaluated by employees of the companies. -NT). And after the performance in May of this year, in the television show “Crazy Money” (Mad Money), the gift reported on the network: “He did not constitute (according to his mother).”

“Of course, the largest challenge in the life of Khosrovshahi, like all of us, was, in fact, the move to the USA itself and the need to assimilate in a new country. And living in the Iranians in America 1980-1 was not so easy, especially when people sang "bombs, bombs, bombs for Iran"

American dream

The success story of the Khosrovshahi family determines the political views of the new head of Uber. “Some Americans do not understand how popular the American Dream brand is all over the world. I am an example of what power this product has. Today, our president is trying to deprive this dream of people of a certain origin and religious beliefs. I find this sad and contradicting what our founding fathers wanted to create, ”Khosrovshahi said in an interview with Bloomberg while still the head of ExpeDia.

This service was one of the first, in February 2017, he openly supported the decision of the Federal Court in Call (Washington) to completely suspend the decree of Donald Trump on the ban on the entrance to the country of citizens of Iran, Somalia, Sudan, Yemen, Syria and Libya. In a letter that Khosrovshahi then wrote to his employees, he recalled that he himself from the family of migrants who hoped for the best future for their children.

“I still expect that our president will begin to comply with our expectations, but so far he fails for failure,” Dara wrote in his Twitter on August 15. Now so many hopes are entrusted to the Khosrovshah itself that the new CEO Uber is clearly not easy in the near future.

“Some Americans do not understand how popular the American Dream brand is all over the world. I am an example of what power this product has. Today, our president is trying to deprive this dream of people of certain origin and religious beliefs "