[peteboyd]

Let's say driverless cars happen in the next five to ten years. I see two scenarios happening - neither do I need uber. First scenario is my local car at my house becomes driverless. I can simply call my car to pick me up from anywhere. It can return home and wait (or go and pick up others as it's own on demand taxi). I now don't need uber at all - even though I use them now. So that is not a good scenario.

Second scenario is I am traveling and need a car/taxi as my local car is at home. If so, why would not other people in that city simply allow for their cars to pick me up while they are not in use. Every driverless car is now a taxi.

Basically all that is needed is an app and some service where owners subscribe and let their cars be used as a taxi. Perhaps uber controls the app and service as the dominant leader. But I bet there will be a lot of competition in that area with car rental companies, manufacturers, local cab companies, individuals and uber all competing.

I suppose the third scenario is that many people do not own a car in the future and we just subscribe to a car service. Perhaps in that area uber is the choice. But perhaps the manuacturers roll their own service too that you subscribe for a time share of a car.

[jpalomaki]

Or could you actually get rid of your own car and ride only on Uber? Due to it's scale, Uber might be able to offer competitive pricing.

If there is no driver involved the cost structure for you and Uber is pretty much the same. Except Uber can probably negotiate better deals on new cars and service (due to volume) and also achieve higher utilization. On the other hand, Uber of course needs to make a profit.

[marklyon]

I've done exactly this. I live in a city with ok, but not great, public transit. When we started having constant issues with our metro, I started taking Uber to and from work.

It's more expensive than the train, but cheaper than buying a car, paying operating expenses, paying for parking at my apartment and paying for parking at work by a dramatic amount.

For longer uses or multi-stop errands, I grab a Car2Go or a Zipcar. For whole-day trips or longer, I head to National where I can pick any car from the Aisle for around $50/day.

[prostoalex]

> Uber can probably negotiate better deals on new cars and service (due to volume)

Same argument could be applied to car rental businesses (some of which are owned by automakers which makes the relationship super-cozy), yet I've never seen a deal from Avis or Hertz to make it a worthwhile replacement to owning.

Big cities have an added cost of parking and extra miles driven to find a gas station or a public charger. But big cities also have low-cost public transportation (or so I've heard, I live in LA).

In smaller towns the cost of ownership tends to be lower and with sub-$10,000 products on the market http://jalopnik.com/5072303/new-pricing-of-9990-makes-2009-n... you have a reliable guaranteed ride whose cost is usually spread over 6-7 years.

[IanCal]

I actually find the cost of renting cars makes a decent amount of sense for me, given how infrequently I use them. However, it's such a hassle, since I've got to go quite out of the way to where they're kept and I can only return them at inconvenient times (or I have to rent for two days because they're not open at the weekend, for example).

Being able to book one to use for a journey then let it go home would be great.

[prostoalex]

Yeah, agree on that. Some rental places don't mind delivering the car to you, e.g. https://www.hertz.com/rentacar/productservice/index.jsp?targ... and I vaguely remember some startup car rental place advertising just that.

Important to note that currently it's the Uber and Lyft drivers that are subsidizing the cost of getting the car to you - they are not getting paid for the miles driven. Whether or not this cost will be subsidized by Uber/Lyft in the future remains to be seen.

[soufron]

Why would they get better deals than car companies themselves?

[MrBuddyCasino]

>> the third scenario is that many people do not own a car in the future and we just subscribe to a car service

I have a feeling this is whats going to happen. People bought records, now they subscribe to Spotify.

Question is who will make money? Spotify does not, because labels have monopoly rights.

I cannot see a scenario where Uber is the winner here. Unlike record companies, there is competition between car companies, but still Uber has no entrenched position here to make a lot of money as far ad I can see.

[hobarrera]

> I see two scenarios happening - neither do I need uber

You'd need Uber or another Uber-like alternative.

Scenario one requires that you make a massive investment in purchasing your own car - while using Uber's will be cheaper unless you're using cars all day long.

Scenario two requires an app for the coordination/hailing. That's where Uber would come in.