Author: Michael J. de la Merced / Source: New York Times
It’s a timeworn tradition for technology companies to resort to an array of jargon and technical terms to describe their operations — especially if they’re not making a profit.
There’s WeWork’s “community-adjusted Ebitda,” which strips out expenses like taxes and marketing.
Or you may have forgotten about “adjusted consolidated segment operating income,” also known as “Acsoi” (pronounced ACK-soy), which Groupon briefly used in the run-up to its initial public offering. (To critics, such measures sometimes equate to “earnings without all the bad stuff.”)[Uber is losing $1.8 billion a year, its I.P.O. filing reveals.]
Uber is no exception, deploying a number of metrics in its newly filed prospectus to describe how well its core business is doing, despite running a $1.8 billion loss last year. If you’re unfamiliar with them, here’s a glossary to help you out.
Gross bookings
“The total dollar value, including any applicable taxes, tolls and fees, of ride-sharing and new mobility rides, Uber Eats meal deliveries and amounts paid by shippers for Uber Freight shipments, in each case without any adjustment for consumer discounts and refunds, driver and restaurant earnings, and driver incentives.”
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It’s the total dollar amount that Uber gets from every ride, meal delivery or freight shipment, before the delivery person gets a cut and other costs are excluded.
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Uber had $49.8 billion in gross bookings last year, up 45 percent from 2017.
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But the…
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