CBI Demo Days & AI 100. GM-Uber, Alphabet-Lyft. UberEATS growth.
Switching dance partners
Hi there,
Alphabet’s CapitalG growth arm (formerly Google Capital) has finalized a billion-dollar financing to Lyft, cementing the Google parent’s divorce from Uber. Alphabet was an early Uber investor, via Google Ventures in the startup’s 2013 Series C:
Lyft has now raised $1.6B in disclosed capital in 2017, nearly doubling its total funding ahead of a potential IPO. Other Uber rivals are bulking up, too; see our 8,000+ word Uber Strategy Teardown for a competitive landscape deep dive.
Although Lyft has been racking up positive headlines in the wake of Uber’s dumpster fire of a year, UberEATS has been one bright spot of growth for the embattled company. A report this week had the food delivery business accounting for up to 10% of Uber’s global gross bookings.
Another recent report points toward a potential tie-up between GM Cruise and Uber, despite GM’s $500M stake in Lyft. The GM-Lyft partnership aimed to field thousands of self-driving Bolts in 2018, but the two are said to have drifted apart as of late.
Regardless of whether the GM-Uber deal materializes, expect that early AV and ride-hailing agreements will continue to be broken and reshuffled. As AVs mature, the nitty-gritty details of monetization and data-/revenue-sharing will be another challenge for the complex web of relationships in the space.
Techstars Mobility 2017
The Techstars Mobility team held their third-annual demo days in Detroit this week, with a diverse set of 11 companies spanning active motorcycle safety, carbon fiber recycling, car subscriptions, and more.
We’ll kick off with our first-ever Demo Day and also unveil this year’s AI 100 list of up-and-coming startups applying AI across mobility and other industries.