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Comment by Lukeas14 | Hacker News Reader

Sounds nice from a PR standpoint but you can't really compare the two companies based on revenue growth. Lyft is still a smaller company so in a global industry it's much easier for it to grow faster on a percentage basis. They're still expanding to cities where Uber already exists. If you started a rideshare company and gave 11 rides this month you'd be growing 10x faster than Lyft.

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I agree. They just recently entered Canada (and it seems only one province), so of course they are going to have bigger revenue growth than Uber as they enter new markets.

A stretch: is Lyft going to use these metrics to go public before Uber to hype itself up?

This is an interesting question - who loses by IPOing first? The company who did it first or the company who comes next?

It seems like it Lyft has everything to gain and little to lose by building a growth story and rushing out to IPO. They get to set the price, they could be used as an Uber proxy which would increase demand for their stock, and more.

Incidentally, my experience with Lyft here in Canada has been pretty dismal. On average pretty terrible drivers. I have a feeling Lyft is getting all the Uber rejects. If that's the case, this is going to derail Lyft's Canadian debut pretty badly. I wonder if this is a common problem when they come into an Uber-dominated market.

My experience is with the other end, I have been querying Uber drivers about their feelings about a possible upcoming entry of Lyft in my province's market. So far, on my small sample 10<n<15, it has been unanimous that they would adopt Lyft since they have a reputation among drivers of taking a smaller margin. Some of the drivers also told me that they plan to serve as drivers for both at the same time.

I live in NYC, however I'm from Toronto and spent a couple of weeks there last month. I don't use Uber, don't have it on my phone and I was surprised to learn how new lyft is to Canada. The lyft drivers I experienced seemed really good, however, when I asked them about why they downloaded lyft, they consistently said it was because of the 30 day no commission take from lyft, but they had no loyalty to the company. One guy even said he plans to delete it and move back to Uber once the entry offer is expired.

I've seen these anecdotes one way or the other (pro/anti Uber/Lyft/whatever) and I think they're all pretty useless when trying to extrapolate to the broader population. One thing that is abundantly clear, at least in the US city where I live, is that Uber and Lyft are pushing hard for the same pool of drivers; many drivers drive for multiple ride share services. I'm extremely skeptical of "one company's drivers are better" stories given they're all largely the same drivers.

> many drivers drive for multiple ride share services

This has absolutely been my experience in a city where both have operated for awhile. Things may be different in cities where one service is newer.

Drivers may express a preference for one or the other, but ultimately they drive for whichever one earns them more income at a given time of day.

Agreed, every driver I’ve asked is on both apps and switches freely to make money.

They might stick with one for a bit to get certain bonuses but there’s no long term loyalty for any of them.

So we need a car sharing aggregator app now? How do I know which is cheaper, Lyft or Uber, when I ask for a ride?

You can try Apple's Maps app. (Does Google Maps have it to?) There is a 'ride-share' choice (or some similar terminology) when choosing route methods, and selecting it presents both Uber and Lyft (if you have the apps installed) and side-by-side price comparisons with the ability to book right there. It should be noted that integration with the Maps app is handled by Lyft and Uber themselves - they can choose what values to present to the user.

Google Maps absolutely has this as well.

Definitely. Lately I see more vehicles in my area with both Uber and Lyft decals than with only one or the other.

It seems there's even a market catering to these people now: https://www.amazon.com/Driver-Light-Removable-Suction-Ridesh...

It's funny you mention this. I know Uber has a lot of bad PR but my friend at Lyft was telling me how it's kind of an awkward situation where yeah sure Uber is a competitor for them but they have done so much for paving the way for ride-sharing being allowed in many different places.

but if they are entering markets where Uber already exists, wouldn't there users mainly be ex-uber users ? unlikely that all of them are new users. Unless people user both at the same time, but it could still eat into ubers revenue in those regions.

... and ex-Uber drivers — meaning drivers who were kicked off Uber due to poor user ratings. This would explain what's going on with Lyft's intro to Canada right now. Awful customer service every time I've used Lyft.

A similar situation was seen in India, when Uber entered the market. Most of the then-existing hail-taxi users were users of Ola (the home-grown service). Users here use both apps at the same time (comparing ride prices to make the choice). This meaning Uber and Ola eat into each other's revenues and markets across cities in India.

This is how you can lie with statistics.

Clearly, Techcrunch should know better.

they're becoming the "Buzzfeed" of tech

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