Listening to two speakers from Airbnb and Uber back-to-back on the same stage at ITB Berlin drummed home the amazing and scary scale the two companies have built in a short time and how disruptive they truly are at all levels. Both were interviewed by Philip Wolf, founder of Phocuswright during the Marketing & Distribution Day.
From the time of its founding in August 2008 till now, 30 million customers have now used Airbnb, 10 million of whom came onboard last year. The only countries it’s not found are in North Korea, Syria and Iran and Oliver Gremillon, managing director, EMEA, says, “We’ll get there.”
Gremillon: Ignorance is our greatest enemy.
In 2014, Uber recorded 140 million rides, averaging one million rides a day.
If you consider the typical adoption curve, from innovators to early adopters, early majority, vast majority and laggards, you could argue these two companies are still at the early majority stage and well, literally, the world is their oyster.
According to Pierre-Dimitri Gore-Coty, general manager, Western Europe for Uber, there are one billion cars in the world, and most only use 4% of capacity so there’s a lot of spare inventory to aggregate.
Likewise with Airbnb when you consider the number of homes on the planet. Gremillon said 80-90% of supply listed on Airbnb are primary homes and that 50% of its business now comes from Europe – 50% of listings, 50% of customers.
It cracked the European market when it made the shift from technology to hospitality company. “As soon as you think you are a hospitality company, you need to be closer to the market,” he said. It now has eight offices in Europe.
Gore-Coty, who joined Uber in 2012 and was its third employee outside the US, said pre-Uber, there were 1,000 limousines in Paris and now there are 10,000 in the French capital city.
Both companies have had their share of battles in Europe. In Berlin, there is continued disgruntlement over Airbnb and Uber also faces challenges in some markets.
“Our biggest enemy is ignorance. When people don’t understand what we do, they fear it,” said Gremillon.
Timing is also everything and the fact that both companies came along at the same time have probably helped them gain faster traction.
“Transportation is social, it’s about going out. We have relied on people to spread the word for us, to recommend to their friends,” said Gore-Coty. It is also interesting to note that India is Uber’s second biggest market.
Gore-Coty: “Transportation is social.”
“Technology makes it safer and more reliable for people to move around. It helps drivers make more tips an hour, female drivers can share progress on the ride, we can track the drivers by ID, there’s a rating mechanism for drivers and you can share the trip with friends and family,” said Gore-Coty.
He said if a driver’s rating gets too low, “we take it seriously”. The driver is first coached and then monitored before a decision is taken to remove the driver or not.
The growing smartphone penetration across the world has also helped both brands. In 2014, the global smartphone audience totaled 1.75 billion and between 2013 and 2017, mobile phone penetration will rise from 61.1% to 69.4% of the global population, according to eMarketer.
Essentially, what the two brands have done is use technology to build trust between strangers – now one can book an apartment as easily in Bangkok as in Stuttgart and book cars and taxis anywhere with a single credit card entry.
And imagine that they’ve only just begun.
• Featured image credit (building up trust concept): OtmarW/iStock
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