Wednesday, May 6, 2020
Uber Says Will Cut 3,700 Jobs, CEO Dara Khosrowshahi 14 to Waive Base Salary
Uber to cut 3,700 jobs, CEO Khosrowshahi to waive base salary
Facebook names first members of oversight board that can overrule Mark Zuckerberg
Facebook's efforts are laudable, but the Oversight Board does not end debates over online speech or legitimize content moderation choices by other platforms (David Kaye/Just Security)
Facebook's efforts are laudable, but the Oversight Board does not end debates over online speech or legitimize content moderation choices by other platforms — With the Naming of Oversight Board Members, What Kind of Institution Will This Become? — With Facebook's unveiling of the first 20 …
Inkscape, a 16-year-old open source project, has released version 1.0 of its free vector graphics editor for Linux, Windows, and macOS (Sarvottam Kumar/Fossbytes)
Inkscape, a 16-year-old open source project, has released version 1.0 of its free vector graphics editor for Linux, Windows, and macOS — With over 16 years of heavy development, the open-source graphics editor Inkscape has finally hit a milestone with the release of version 1.0.
Rights group IFF moves PMO, MHA over coercion to use Aarogya Setu in Noida
BSF Constable Result 2020 – Head Constable (RO/ RM) Exam Result Released
BSF Result 2020 – Head Constable (RO/ RM) Exam Result Released
Internal document reveals Twitch is looking to fund a slate of original, unscripted series that would be live and interactive on dating, sports, music, and more (Lucas Shaw/Bloomberg)
Internal document reveals Twitch is looking to fund a slate of original, unscripted series that would be live and interactive on dating, sports, music, and more — - Amazon unit will bankroll slate of unscripted series this year — Use of Twitch has exploded during the coronavirus pandemic
PayPal sees strong Q2 as online spending surge
How Lyft intends to navigate and survive COVID-19
A glimpse at Lyft’s stock price Wednesday, which soared as much as 16.77% after first-quarter earnings were reported, suggested all was well in the ride-hailing company’s world.
In this COVID 19-era, “well” is a relative term. Lyft’s net losses did dramatically improve from the year-ago quarter (a loss of $398 million versus $1.1 billion in Q1 2019). However, Lyft was clear in its earnings call: COVID-19 had a profound impact on its customers and its business and the future was uncertain.
“It is impossible to accurately predict the duration and depth of the economic downturn we face,” Lyft CFO Brian Roberts said during an earnings call Wednesday afternoon. “Our business may be impacted for an extended period of time. So we must be prepared to adapt accordingly.”
The difficulty of predicting what will happen has hamstrung thousands of companies trying to navigate the COVID-19 pandemic. Last month, Lyft withdrew its previously provided revenue and adjusted EBITDA guidance for full year 2020 because of the vast unknowns.
“Given this fluidity, it is impossible for us to predict with any certainty our results,” Roberts said. After the requisite warnings, Roberts did eventually provide an outlook for the second quarter — and it isn’t pretty. The outlook focused on adjusted EBITDA, which doesn’t give the most complete financial picture. It provides enough to understand that even with considerable cost-cutting measures, Lyft will suffer losses nearly four times wider than the first quarter.
Roberts said Lyft can manage to keep its second quarter adjusted EBITDA loss under $360 million if rides on its rideshare platform remain at April levels — which were down 75% year-over-year — for the remainder of the quarter. Lyft reported Wednesday an adjusted EBITDA loss of $85.2 million in the first quarter.
There are some early signs of a recovery. Ridership in the week ended May 3 was up 21% from the lows experienced in mid-April, according to Lyft. However, Lyft can’t afford to simply hope rideshare will return. It has to — and already has — enact a plan that will allow it to navigate the pandemic and come out as a survivor. In other words, Lyft will be judged at how well can stem the losses and find new revenue streams.
Work to cut costs has already started.
The company put together an aggressive plan to strengthen its financial position, Lyft co-founder and CEO Logan Green said during the earnings call. Lyft reduced its more than 5,000-person workforce by 17% and furloughed nearly another 300. Lyft also initiated a three-month pay reduction for all salaried employees, ranging from 10% for its most non-hourly team members, up to 30% for its senior leadership team and board members.
“Every other expense line is being scrutinized and no stone will be left unturned,” Green said.
The company expects to be able to cut its annualized fixed costs by $300 million by the end of the year. The reductions are based on its original expectations for 2020. Lyft has also ended rider coupons once ridership began to decline in mid-March and paused adding new drivers in nearly all markets.
“This reduces costs we incur associated with onboarding new drivers and helps protect utilization and earnings opportunities for existing drivers during this time of lower ride demand,” Green said.
Lyft reduced its 2020 capital expenditure plan by $250 million. And its sought out cost savings on the insurance front. (The company’s primary auto insurance policies expire at the end of September; Roberts said they’re considering the best options to reduce future volatility, as well as lower overall costs.)
The company is also shifting attention and resources to projects that executives believe will improve its unit economics. Finding those revenue streams will be tricky. Lyft has already provided a few clues of where it’s headed.
The company will continue with its Essential Deliveries pilot that launched April 15. The initiative lets government agencies, local non-profits, businesses and healthcare organizations request on-demand delivery of meals, groceries, life-sustaining medical supplies, hygiene products and home necessities.
Green said the company will evaluate any future opportunities based on how it performs. But he quickly added “that we have no interest in launching a consumer food delivery service. And so, we will not be doing that.”
Green also seemed cautiously optimistic about a new lost cost product called “Wait and Save,” that allows Lyft optimize the marketplace and be more efficient with matching drivers and riders.
Epic Games says Fortnite has 350M registered players, up from 250M in March 2019; in April, players logged 3.2B hours in the game (Nick Statt/The Verge)
Epic Games says Fortnite has 350M registered players, up from 250M in March 2019; in April, players logged 3.2B hours in the game — More than 3.2 billion hours played in April alone — Epic's Fortnite has more than 350 million registered players, the game developer announced on Wednesday.
KN Govindacharya sends legal notice flagging Aarogya Setu's privacy concerns
SpaceX's S-1 excerpts list "manufacturing our own GPUs" among the "substantial capital expenditures" it is undertaking, with the size of the expenditure TBD (Reuters)
Reuters : SpaceX's S-1 excerpts list “manufacturing our own GPUs” among the “substantial capital expenditures” it is undertaking, wit...
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The first project we remember working on together was drawing scenes from the picture books that our mom brought with her when she immigrate...
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Sohee Kim / Bloomberg : South Korean authorities are investigating a data leak at e-commerce giant Coupang that exposed ~33.7M accounts; ...
