They already will be selling your ride data and there is no way they could monitor conversations in the car for commercial purposes (at least in Western countries).
Ads in cars, partnerships with alternative destinations, etc. definitely would feel like enshitification for a demographic comparable to the hacker news one here. But these are all per session/user settings just like most of us have a paid Spotify account and never see advertising and those who don't get a very different monetized experience.
What is exciting about monetization like this is the possibility for rides to become very cheap or even free. If my dentist offers free rides to the office in return for my loyalty, I'm quite happy to take that.
> If my dentist offers free rides to the office in return for my loyalty, I'm quite happy to take that.
That's actually a really interesting angle. The same way businesses often provide free parking now... what if they start providing free self-driving round trips?
E.g. spend $75 or more at Whole Foods, and get free round-trip up to 20 miles or something. Especially for bulky items like groceries where a car makes a big difference, I can totally see that becoming standard. Home Depot too. Plus entertainment like amusement parks, movie theaters, spas...
It makes particular sense for vertically integrated conglomerates like Amazon-Whole Foods which owns Zoox.
I buy Whole Foods French fries shipped to the store via Amazon logistics and purchase those at Amazon owned Whole Foods, at a discount via my Prime membership on my Amazon credit card which is processed on AWS infrastructure and I ride home on an Amazon owned Zoox that also runs on AWS infrastructure.
Amazon owns so much of the profit margin across that stack that they can afford to give rides away for example.
> there is no way they could monitor conversations in the car for commercial purposes (at least in Western countries)
people used to feel that way about search queries, email (gmail) and IP laws (LLM training).
> What is exciting about monetization like this is the possibility for rides to become very cheap or even free. If my dentist offers free rides to the office in return for my loyalty, I'm quite happy to take that.
this won't happen. alphabet will collect on both ends.
> and there is no way they could monitor conversations in the car for commercial purposes (at least in Western countries).
Why not? You can consent to having your audio recorded. They can even offer a higher “private” price and a lower “ad supported” price. I write “private” because I assume the microphones will always be listening no matter which price you pay.
I guess that's semantics. If you opt in then yes I guess they could do anything. I think the point was that enshitification would occur if they forced you to do that.
You could opt in to have blood or plasma taken on every ride if you so wanted I guess.
As a plasma donor you can earn $30-$70 per session for 800 ml. Let's call it $50. A session takes about 90 minutes, or 533 ml/hour, and you make $33/hour
Waymo charges $0.50 - $1.00 per mile. Let's use the high end.
To break even, your Waymo will need to consume < $33/hour, or < 33 mph. That's not bad!
If you go any faster, you won't be able to extract enough plasma in the same amount of time.
You really think ads in vehicle are not coming? You’re being naive if you think that.
Also, cheap rides cut into stocks margins. That won’t fly by investors either. These companies are not charities. They are in the business of maximizing profits. We lost “don’t be evil” over a decade ago.
It's a very capital intensive operation given the amount of vehicles that need to be carried on the balance sheet.
There are many reasons why a conglomerate like Alphabet doesn't want to hold all of that directly on the balance sheet, which is why Waymo is run as a subsidiary with its own sources of capital.
When I was at Uber 10 plus years ago and we were ideating autonomous vehicles. The general consensus was that we would run the technology platform and private equity would own fleets of cars built and operated to our specification.
Waymo has concluded either we are too early in the journey to decouple the tight vertical integration or they want to go very big and own all of the capital expenditure for what will presumably be a global rollout ultimately.
For anyone like me with a finance and technology crossover interest I actually think this is as interesting, maybe more interesting, than the private equity play around data centers at the moment because all of that is constrained against chip delivery and power constraints.
"Tech" was incredible light on CapExp compared with everything else (until AI hit, that is). That is what allowed its explosive growth. On the one hand alphabet is not used to that. On the other hand it is turning into a more normal business with more CapExp, and like other more "normal" business it uses more external investment. As a general rule of thumb: The more capex, the more leverage; for example commodity extraction, infrastructure or power generation are very capex heavy, and heavily leveraged.
I disagree with their reasoning and would say it's more for strategic benefits.
Giving firms that they get along well with (like Sequoia) allocation feels like a mix between a favor and possibly a way to signal that the valuation has some external buy-in too.
> The general consensus was that we would run the technology platform and private equity would own fleets of cars built and operated to our specification.
Private equity, or private capital (debt investors)? Although I guess PC was less of a thing 10 years ago.
What I'm talking about is that is still considered an external capital raise for the purpose of the markets and where those assets sit on the balance sheet.
Also, keep in mind the Alphabet doesn't fully own Waymo. I don't know the percentage ownership of hand, but that also feels like it's probably a prorated investment based on ownership so Alphabet doesn't reduce its voting control.
Yes and what matters the most is what Waymo has been signaling for years. They don’t want the capex (owning and running the physical cars). I don’t know the intent of this raise but you have to realize companies may have a good asset but they don’t want to own it 100% for a multitude of reasons. Some of them could be as simple as wanting to get other investors involved and comfortable with the asset to maybe take on larger roles in future rounds. Or in this case potentially running the car part of the business.
If they truly wanted the capex, this would not be a mixed round
A fully internal recap would have been simpler. The presence of outside capital, even minority, is consistent with a gradual transition toward shared ownership, asset light structures, or operator partners.
They have made many comments over the years about this too.
Notice I left a list of potential reasons. Not that ownership has changed. Just pointing out for folks like yourself that Google has made commentary about this exploring the idea of partnering with companies that operate the physical fleet. $3bn even if chump change for you is still a larger placement and has some level of signaling indicating the want to get other folks involved at some level.
I didn't ask for potential reasons. You're talking about the "reasons" for a "gradual transition," and I am telling you that this investment isn't transitioning anything. Everyone is keeping their equal share of the company. So, I don't understand why you are giving reasons for something that isn't currently happening.
I think the words are going over your head sorry. I will try one more time but realize now it might be too much especially see some of your dead comments here.
I am not claiming a transition is happening in this round, so asking for evidence of one misses the point. Transition here means enabling future shifts in who owns and operates the capex, not changing the cap table today. If Alphabet wanted permanent full-stack ownership, an entirely internal recap would have been cleaner. Bringing in outside capital, even minority, is about signaling and optionality, not dilution.
I understand everything you have said. The D-K of you WSB transplants is wildly frustrating.
If you'll notice, all I am doing is asking the brigade of snarky know-nothings to stop talking. I'm not pretentiously claiming to know, unlike all of you. You clearly aren't in any position to understand the internal working of Google, and it's unfortunate that HN used to be a place where a question like the original one would have been answered by a person who does, but is now flooded with people like you. I will gladly take the downvotes if they're from a bunch of garage band stock pickers.
Go take a breath and stop digging a hole. Nobody is being rude to you but you are highly inflammatory and honestly a real lowering of quality. Take a bit of your medicine and step away. I am sorry you feel the need to be so rude back to everyone.
You are not “just asking questions.” You are dismissing any analysis that is not insider gossip as illegitimate, which is a convenient way to avoid engaging with the substance. No one claimed NDA level insight. We are talking about incentives, capital structure, and signaling, which is literally what outsiders analyze. If only Googlers are allowed to reason about Google, then HN has no purpose beyond rumor laundering.
I definitely modulated my tone to match yours and some of your killed comments. Sorry you don’t like what you see. Happy to have a discussion but not be told I am someone from Reddit. Low effort and low class. You are consistently being rude and you just need to reflect on some of your comments. Your right my comment back to you was definitely not nice but look at some of your killed comments. Ick.
Sure thing boss. What other advice stemming from your vast experience, wealth, and psychological heath do you have for me? I'd love to improve my image to you... the "ick" police.
My finance people care about the cents, a ROI of 7% is average but at 8.5% and now you are a world class asset of that inventory type. That’s sometimes the difference of a few hundred k out of 20m but they would not take the deal if it is slightly over due to their risk appetite.
The 3b external either matters a ton to fit their risk models OR they are doing a favor to an outside party. Probably a bit of both.
Well, given that it is an equity sale, split still feels like it is the prorated amount so that alphabet continues to own its percentage - not more not less.
Obviously you're entitled to your view, but I don't think it's that kind of finance model right now - it's far too speculative and the upside too unknown to be adjusting for small amounts on risk models.
The concern, I think, is that their spare cash is dwindling and thus financial prudence might be beneficial - especially for those who rely on the core Mozilla propositions like Firefox.
The last I heard was that the Google rev-share agreement was on the skids and they stopped developing projects like Thunderbird and Fake Spotter because they were capital constrained.
If you know otherwise then you're better informed than I am I guess
This might be financial prudence of sorts - doesn't something like 80% of their yearly monetary contributions come from Google, particularly for search partnerships? If they are concerned that Google will start paying them less because search has diminishing future returns, diversifying their income sources through investments in AI might be a good idea.
If your comment is referring to the bending spoons business model, it's worth pointing out they are not VC, they are private equity.
If your comment is referring to the software company's exiting to provide a return to shareholders, that happens all the time whether it's venture-backed or privately owned. The owners of privately held bootstrapped companies still want an exit one day too.
As an open source software engineer who is now a venture capital investor, respectfully, I think your beef is with capitalism, not with the institutional investors.
Not in the startup world beyond what I pick up on HN, but this distinction was helpful. My mental model going forward:
- If a company is still validating the business model and optimizing for rapid growth, it’s typically a Venture Capitalist (VC) fit.
- If a company is already established and the play is to improve operations, scale, or restructure (often involving a change of control), it’s typically a Private Equity (PE) fit.
Reminder that restructure often means a company working just fine, but whose assets outstrip what PE can buy it for, so they strip it to the bones. Or they leverage it with debt against assets then pay that money to themselves for consulting, account/hr services that they force the company to outsource to other PE companies. Nothing is 'created' through this process, no value created/added, nor it is healthy capitalism as the company could have continued fine without this added leveraged debt that was purely used to profit PE.
One of the frustrating things about international roaming in the UK is typically your plan does not include coverage on this neutral network on the underground
I had a fun situation when I had friends visiting me in Japan for a road trip. One friend's US-model Android phone didn't support the specific low bands used for sparse coverage in rural Japan, but the repeaters inside of the tunnels were all on standard 2100 MHz, so whenever we drove through a tunnel he rushed to his phone to get some messages through. Kind of the opposite to what you usually experience with loss of signal in tunnels :)
Source? As someone that comes back to London every month, I’ve been able to roam the same as anywhere else in the UK. I’d be shocked if this were true.
Did the UK stop people from just picking up a cheap SIM at the Airport? I always like a local number when traveling. Anyway, Indian Roaming plans are so cheap these days that it's much easier and cheaper to just subscribe to them as part of the plan. These days, I don’t even need to add/activate it or anything, the providers turn it ON when I start my phone outside India and turn it off when I re-activate back in India.
The main problem if you're roaming is that you're considered a lower-priority customer, and since the network is often saturated already, you don't get any bandwidth.
Give the government your name, postal address, email address and citizenship information to store on a government database in order to protest against the government having your name, postal address, email address and citizenship information to store on a government database.
Not in my experience. I put a free item on Craigslist once and it was like a feeding frenzy. The first person who emailed me got it, but between their email and them getting to my house to pick it up, I got at least 40 other emails. It was very overwhelming.
Yea, I did the same thing on Craigslist exactly one time before learning my lesson, and got the same feeding frenzy. Now if I want to give something away, I just set it out by the curb with a “free, first come, first serve” note on it, and it’s gone in under 30 minutes.
My wife and I were moving city and needed rid of some perfectly functional appliances and furniture.
We listed it all for free because we needed it gone quick and the cost of taking it with us was too high.
When by the next day we'd had one enquiry from someone who didn't turn up, we changed tactic and switched everything to £1.
Within a day the entire lot was gone, people turning up with copper coins from their piggy bank which we told them to keep.
One fond memory of that was a student looking guy who came to the door for the dining table, I opened the door and greeted him, extending my hand for a hand shake, and he looked confused for a couple of seconds, didn't say a word, then reached in his pocket for the money and held it out. Never had anyone misunderstand an invitation for a handshake before or since.
had a similar experience getting rid of furnitures the owner told me i could dispose of: free brings no eyeballs on it, €10 and people were begging if i could do at €8 :)
Haha, my wife says she gets similar when trying to give things away on apps like Vinted etc. List it free and nothing, put it up there for a few quid and people will do their best to get a "deal".
I wonder if it's a UX thing in these apps that the "free" stuff isn't surfacing but low-priced things are. Perhaps there's just too much free stuff to stand out.
We get the opposite on FB marketplace. £0 gets you a load of weirdos, scammers and unreliables, £5 gets you mostly normal people who will pick it up when they say they will.
Remember Snowden outlined the Google<>US government interface:
The US agency would type in the gmail address of the subject (ie the primary key/identifier) and somewhere between the agency and Google a decision would be automatically made as to whether the owner of the account was a US person* or not.
If yes - FISA warrant was required
If no - the US agency user would have immediate access to the entire google account (think Google Take Out).
In other words, if you were not a US person there was no duty to protect data.
* = US Person is either a US citizen located anywhere in the world or anyone of any nationality who is physically in the US (current interpretation includes visa holders, visitors and even undocumented but that's shifting)
Is there a tech scene in Exeter? I have long lived in San Francisco having moved from UK in 2006 but I spent a lot of time down in Devon where my parents now live.
Would Exeter be a good location, in comparison to the home counties, to set up a startup where most employees WFH 90% of the time?
I really like the area, and my preferred locations in Oxon & Cambs are getting incredibly expensive in terms of real estate, which doesn't make sense in case of WFH.
I wouldn’t call it a scene, but there’s a small handful of people and the occasional meet-up or event. I’m near Exeter after working in London for ~10 years.
Hi to anyone else who’s down in Devon :)
(Hit me up via my profile if you’d like to grab a coffee)
Heh, not sure. I moved to the US in 2008. I think you and I talked about this when you were at WordCamp Boston when you were doing stuff with WPEngine.
I think at least one of the W3C staff is in Devon.
wow you have a much better memory than I do, I don't even remember anything about the event (tbf for several years I used to attend a WordCamp somewhere practically every other week!)
Not really, there’s a bit of one in Bristol, but from what I see of job postings down there, salaries aren’t that high, comparable to much of the rest of the U.K. outside of London
The MetOffice has their software stuff down in Exeter but it’s <£45k for people with experience in scientific computing and HPC
Yeah he's right - my Pixel 10 is not as sexy as an iPhone but not only is the keyboard great but the AI integration is first class citizen.
iOS will never have first class citizen AI even if Apple finally develop their own model because Apple doesn't control the user's data.