Uber is an app for ride-sharing, which can have a big impact on the environment if the majority of the population uses it as an alternative to personal cars. However, it is hard to persuade everybody to give up the comfort of their own space for a bus or subway, leading to inspired entrepreneurs coming up with alternatives. Uber is one of these alternatives, which works by ordinary people operating as drivers and offering taxi-like services to other ordinary people in need of transportation.
But how did this company, most commonly credited with pioneering the ride-share industry start? Let’s go back to its origins. The story of Uber started in Paris, in 2008 when entrepreneurs Travis Kalanick and Garrett Camp participated in a LeWeb conference, about technology. However, this idea sparked only after the conference, when they wanted to order a taxi, but could not find one. At that moment, they got the idea for Uber, a solution to the problem of ordering a taxi.
Initially, Uber propositioned limousine drivers to provide their services in their free time, in order to earn some extra money, with customers being able to order a ride off of a website called UberCab.com.
In 2009, Camp started working on a prototype for UberCab as a secondary project and in the summer of the same year, convinced Kalanick to join him. The app was tested in New York at the beginning of 2010, using just 3 cars and the official launch date was in may that same year.
Uber’s greatest quality was the application’s ease; winning customers over with the service’s effortlessness. In October 2010, the company earned its first major financing, of 1.25 million dollars. However, shortly after this they experienced some obstacles with the Agency of Municipal Transport of San Francisco wanting to close the company down. One of their complaints was regarding the name of the app; specifically including the word cab in the UberCab company name. Coincidentally, the start-up changed its name to Uber, removing the Cab and creating a new website called Uber.com.
2011 was a crucial year for Uber. At the beginning of the year, the company obtained 11 million dollars and started to expand in New York, Seattle, Boston, Chicago and Washington DC, as well as internationally in Paris. In December during the LeWeb conference Kalanick announced that Uber had made 37 millions of dollars.
In 2012, the company extended its services and added UberX, a version of the application which lets you choose to travel with a hybrid vehicle.
That was the story of how Uber began, and most of us know how it ended up. They confronted a lot of issues head on during these years, but they persevered , because they knew the result was going to be worth it.
Keep in mind you can make a difference in the world if you choose to use ride-sharing and not your personal car.
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