- Kevin Hartz, an early Uber angel investor, directed his VC firm A Star Capital to take Waymos only.
- Hartz told BI that he believes Waymo is the "least expensive option."
- A former investor at A Star roughly estimated spending about $10K on Waymos in the past year.
Kevin Hartz, an early Uber angel investor and cofounder of Eventbrite, directed his San Francisco-based venture capital firm, A Star Capital, to only take Waymo robotaxis in the city because he believes they provide the best value.
"Waymo is now required in SF as it is always substantially lower price and often faster," Hartz wrote in an email to his firm of 10 employees on January 16, which was shared on X.
The VC head wrote that a ride in an Uber "Green," the sustainable ride option offered on the platform, was $50 to his destination in San Francisco, whereas a ride back with a Waymo, which only operates Jaguar I-PACE electric vehicles, was $19.
Hartz told Business Insider over the phone that his email was indeed a serious mandate given that employees get their rideshare costs comped by the firm.
"Waymo is simply a better value," he said, adding that he believes "it's the safest and the fastest when you think about its ability to calculate the most efficient route."
Employees can substitute Waymo with another rideshare platform if wait times are too long and would make firm employees late to the office, Hartz wrote in the email.
Since Waymo began offering rides to the SF public in June, the Alphabet-owned company has chipped away at the rideshare market in the city that was once solely dominated by Uber and Lyft.
Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said during the third-quarter earnings call in October that the company puts Waymo's market share within its limited operating areas of SF at "high single-digits or low double digits." He did not state an exact figure.
Waymo said in a press release that it averages 150,000 rides per week throughout its operating cities. The robotaxi company does not offer rides on San Francisco's highways or to the airport.
A Waymo spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
In a study conducted last year by Evercore ISI, comparing 1,000 trips across the Waymo, Uber, and Lyft platforms, analysts found that Waymo's pricing has become increasingly competitive in the fourth quarter of 2024.
The average cost of a Waymo ride for that quarter was $21.91, compared to $21.34 for an UberX — the basic level of service the rideshare platform offers — and $22.36 for a Lyft. Prices for Uber and Lyft exclude tips to drivers, Evercore analysts wrote in their report.
An Uber spokesperson declined to comment. Lyft did not respond to a request for comment.
Hartz said he was an early believer in Uber, participating in the company's series B funding round in 2011 at a $300-million valuation. He declined to disclose a figure.
His experience in Waymo has made him a convert, pointing to the privacy the robotaxi offers.
"It's a quiet place where you can kind of reflect," he said.
Khushi Suri, an ex-investor at A Star, had already embraced Hartz's Waymo-only directive long before he shared his January mandate.
As of February 20, Suri took 547 rides, traveled 1,680 miles, and spent 10,005 minutes inside a Waymo, she told BI. She roughly estimated spending $10,000 on Waymo rides in the past year.
"I remember the way there, I was enchanted," Suri told BI of her first Waymo ride. "But on the ride back, I forgot. It's just so natural."
Suri said she was a heavy Uber user, but "resented it." She said the privacy of a Waymo allows her to feel comfortable when she and her friends are going out and dressed for clubbing.
"With Waymo, there's no walk of shame," she said. "It's very intimate."
Uber and Lyft had originally pursued an in-house autonomous vehicle program before selling them off in 2020 and 2021, respectively. Both rideshare platforms are pursuing partnerships with other autonomous vehicle companies to offer a robotaxi service, leveraging its existing user base.
Uber plans to deepen its existing partnership with the Alphabet-owned company by managing a Waymo fleet in Austin and Atlanta sometime in 2025. The company already offers Waymos in Phoenix.
"I wasn't very happy that Uber had discontinued their self-driving program," Hartz said. "I'm glad that they're partnering there."
