I have for long appreciated the business value of design, but often struggle to understand why big companies tweak their brand in small iterations?
Having read through this, it sounds like the brand team considered more radical changes but ultimately found that the broad name recognition and generally positive associations with the stark black/white aesthetic were too strong to ditch entirely. What remained was the ability to iterate on the original brand, and that's what you got.
I agree with ditching "the bit" icon in favor of a "U" though. That logo made zero sense, and always felt like a creative team stretching to imbue an abstract mark with some sort of meaning.
The answer might be yes for Dara, but it seems unintuitive to me.
It definitely does for me. I'm not an Uber user (doesn't exist in Germany), but I know the previous design system. When I looked through this page, I also had the impression that their new CEO has to do with this because it evokes more feminine qualities than the previous corporate design. I cannot exactly pin-point this; I'm just going by the feelings it evokes in me. It somehow feels warmer and more empathetic to me (to the extent that a tech giant can be perceived as warm and empathetic).
It's definitely what Uber needs right now on the design front. Let's see how much it helps them regain trust.