精译求精系列之五：华尔街如何对优步（Uber）进行估值（上）？

Aslightly abbreviated version of this post  onOctober 9, 2015, and it is the first of series of three on the ride sharingbusiness. In the second post, I value Lyft, the other ride sharing company, andalso look at how ride sharing companies globally are being priced. In the thirdand final post, I look at ride sharing as a business and at four possiblescenarios for its evolution. Those posts will also appear in TechCrunch overthe next two weeks and will be reproduced here soon after.

本篇文章的缩略版本于2015年10月9日被刊登在了Techcrunch上，同时这篇文章也是关于拼车行业的几篇连载中的第一篇。 在第二篇文章里，我对Lyft（另外一家拼车公司）进行了估值，同时也对拼车公司在全球范围内的估值进行了研究分析。在第三篇和最后一篇中，我着重分析了拼车这一商业模式以及在这场拼车革命中可能出现的四种情况。

It seems like ages ago, and perhaps even in a far-off galaxy, that , but it was in June of 2014.One reason it seems like a lot of time has elapsed is that Uber has managed tobe in the news, for good and bad reasons, almost all through this period. Witheach news story, the response is either rapturous or funereal, depending on theresponder’s prior views on the company. Given how eventful this last year hasbeen, I think it is time for me to revisit my estimates, eat some humble pieand redo my valuation.

我总觉得我第一次在博客里面为优步估值是飘荡在浩渺宇宙的某个遥远星河里的很久远的一件事情了，但看了看日期竟然近在2014年的6月。我之所以觉得时间已经过去了很久是因为优步在这期间不论好坏总是能见诸于报端。每一篇报道下面的评论回复要么欢天喜地，要么如丧考批，具体如何还是要看读者之前对该公司的看法是怎样的了。

A look back

回顾

I became interested in Uberafter reading a  that indicated that ithad been valued at $17 billion in a venture capital round. I posted my firstvaluation of Uber in June 2014, viewing it as an urban car service company,with local (but not global) networking benefits. Assuming that it wouldincrease the size of the urban car service market by about 40%, whilepreserving its low capital-investment business model, I valued Uber at justunder $6 billion.

我是在2014年读完一篇新闻故事后才开始对优步产生兴趣的，新闻里说优步公司在一轮风投里被估值到170亿美金。我早在2014年6月就发布了第一篇优步的估值，文中将优步视为一种市内拼车服务公司，同时会给当地（并非全球性的）其他相关产业带来一定收益。即使优步的出现会使市内拼车服务市场的份额增长40%，但考虑到要维持其低成本投入的商业模式，我当时给优步的估值只有不到60亿美金。

While some in the VC communitywere quick to dismiss the valuation, I will remain grateful to BillGurley  where he took me to taskfor having too narrow a vision of Uber’s business model. In his counternarrative, he argued that Uber was not just urban (it could create inroads insuburbia), not just a car service (it was in logistics & transportation)and that it was working with other businesses to create global networkingbenefits. Since Bill, as an early investor in Uber with access to its internalworkings, clearly knew far more about the company than I did, I  and arrived at $54billion as the value that reflected the narrative.

尽管有些风投机构的同僚对我的估值不予理会，但在此我仍然要对比尔格莱表示感谢。他发表了一篇文章，文中批评我对优步的商业模式的评价目光过于短浅。另外，他认为优步并不仅仅是在市内提供服务（因为其服务对象势必会涉及到乡镇居民）；同时，它也不仅仅是拼车服务，（还包括了物流和交通运输）由于它与其他产业有所合作，因此也为相关链条产业创造了全球性的收益。作为优步前期的一名投资者，比尔可以了解到公司内部的具体运作，这可比我这个外行了解的多太多了。我之后参考了比尔的论述对优步进行了重新估值，这次我将估值提高到了540亿美金作为对比尔撰文的回应。

I was then taken to task byvalue investors who took issue with the value changing so dramatically from myassessment to his, and my response was that this was exactly what you shouldexpect, early in the life of a company, where there is room for widelydivergent narratives, and values that reflect these divergences. In December2014, I tried to show this by creating a , where I let readers choose Uber’s market (urban car service, all carservice, logistics or mobility services), the effect it would have on thatmarket’s size (from none to doubling it), the competitive advantages that woulddetermine its cut of the ride receipts (from the existing 20% down to 5%), thenetworking benefits it would have (none, local, partial global, global) andbusiness model (from its current no capital intensity to higher capitalinvestments), and derived values for Uber, ranging from less than $1 billion toclose to $100 billion.

接着我被一些价值型投资人责备，他们认为我的评估和他们的评估实在是相去甚远，我对此的回应是——这不恰恰就是你们想要的吗？一个公司在初期阶段肯定会出现各种不同的声音和论调，而这些论调正是通过不同的估值反映出来的。在2014年的11月，我做了一个名叫你心中的优步估值的问卷来调查关于优步大家不同的看法，在表格里我让读者们自己选择优步的目标市场（选项有市内拼车服务、专车服务、物流或运输服务）、对这一市场份额的影响（从零到加倍）、其竞争优势可能带来的乘车收入的削减（从现在的20%低至5%）、为其相关的链条产业可能带来的收益（完全没有、当地、全球的部分地区、全球）和商业模式（从其目前的零资本密集度到高资本投入）、以及据此推断出的优步的估值（从少于10亿美元到接近1000亿美元）。

The news keeps coming…

源源不断的新闻

As I noted at the top of thispost, it is an understatement to say that Uber has been in the news. Each weekbrings more Uber stories, with some containing good news for those who believethat the company is on a glide path to a $100 billion IPO, and some containingbad news, which evoke predictions of catastrophe from Uber doubters. For me,the test with each news story is to see how that story affects my narrative forUber, and by extension, my estimate of its value. In keeping with thisperspective, I broke the news stories down based upon narrative parts andvaluation inputs.

正如我在本文开头所提到的，优步常常见诸于报端这种说法已经是有所保留的了。每一周优步都会有很多新的报道——例如这个公司正在成为1000亿市值的上市公司的康庄大道上昂首阔步的好消息以及那些对于优步持怀疑态度的人唱衰优步的坏消息。于我而言，检验每一个报道的标准就是看这些报道如何影响我对优步的态度，以及在更宽泛的层面上，如何影响我对优步的估值。为了一直保持这种写作态度，我一般会在叙述层面和价值观输入方面进行剖析。

TheTotal Market 

总体市场
The news on the car service market has been mostly positive, indicating thatthe market is broader, bigger, growing faster and more global than I thought itwas, even a year ago. 

总体而言对汽车服务市场的报道大多都是正面的，这也就意味着这个市场比我一年前预测的要更广、更大；增速更大、影响更加全球化。

1.Not just urban and muchbigger: While car service remains most popular in the urban areas, it is makinginroads into  and . The evidence for this liesnot only in anecdotal evidence and the market capitalizations commanded by ridesharing companies, but also in the numbers that have been leaked by thesecompanies. A  put Uber’s gross billings for 2015 at $10.84billion. It is true that these are unofficial and may have some hype built intothem, but even if that number over estimates revenues by 20% or 25%, thatrepresents a jump of 400% from 2014 levels.

一．不局限于市区内部，市场更大：尽管拼车服务在城市地区更受欢迎，但它仍然会对城市远郊和近郊地区造成一定的影响。这个结论并不仅仅是根据参股公司的市值和其他道听途说的消息判断出来的，同时也是通过参考这些公司泄露的一些数据所得出的。一份针对该公司的潜在投资者的报告中指出优步在2015年度的毛收入达到了108.4亿美金。尽管这份报告不够官方同时也有放卫星的嫌疑，但是即使这个数据高出实际收入20到25个百分点，那也比2014年度增加了400%。

2.Drawing in new customers: One reason for the increasein the car service market is that it is drawing in customers who would neverhave taken been in this market in the first place. While the evidence for thisis still mostly anecdotal, another indicates that ride sharinghas created a market three to four times larger that the original taxi cab/limo market in San Francisco, the city with the longest history with new ridesharing services. While San Francisco is unusual in terms of the highproportion of its population that is young, tech-savvy and single, the argumentthat ride sharing is increasing the size of the market elsewhere, though not tothe same magnitude that it did in the Bay Area, seems to be a solid one.

二．不断吸引新的消费者：拼车服务行业市场不断增长的其中一个原因就是它在不断吸引着之前从未进入过的这个市场的新消费者。这一点的根据目前大多仍是道听途说的，但根据从优步泄露出的一份报告来看其在旧金山的市场份额达到了之前出租车市场的三至四倍，而旧金山是拥有最长新型拼车服务产业历史的城市。虽然旧金山的情况比较特殊（其年轻人口、从事高科技产业人口和单身人口比重较大），但不管旧金山和海湾地区的增速是否是一个量级，这个拼车服务产业市场在不断增长事实是毋庸置疑的。

3.With more diverse offerings: The other reason for thejump in the size of the ride sharing market is that it is no longer just a cabservice, but instead has expanded to include alternatives that expand choices,reduce costs () or increase flexibility.

三，提供多元化服务：拼车服务市场不断增长的另一个原因就是优步不仅仅提供出租车服务，它还为乘客提供了其他扩展服务，减少了乘车成本（例如拼车服务）提高了灵活性。

4.And going global: The biggest stories on ridesharing came out of Asia, as the ride sharing market has exploded in that partof the world, and especially so in  and . That should really come asno surprise since these countries offers the trifecta for ride sharingopportunities: large urban populations, with limited car ownership and bad masstransit systems. 

四. 不断全球化：最大的拼车服务市场来自亚洲。拼车服务市场在全世界遍地开花，尤其在印度和中国。说实话我们对这一点完全不惊讶，毕竟这些亚洲国家城镇人口巨大同时私家车拥有量有限，交通系统也是一团乱麻，这些都为拼车服务公司提供了机遇和市场。

The bad news on the carservice market front has come mostly in the form of , regulatory bans and .  may be the latest cityto restrict Uber, but it is part of a . Even that bad news, though,contains seeds of good news, since the status quo would not be trying so hardto stop the upstarts, if ride sharing was not working. In my view, the attemptsby taxi operators, regulators and politicians to stop the ride sharing servicesreek of desperation, and the markets seem to reflect that. Not only havethe  in New York city droppedsignificantly in the last year, but so has the price of NYC cab medallions,dropping almost 40% in value (roughly $5 billion in the aggregate) in the lasttwo years. While auto sales may not have been affected materially yet, thereare worries that there will be a , as people replace a"second" car or even a "first" car with ride sharingservices.

来自拼车服务市场方面的坏消息大部分都来自出租车司机罢工论坛、管控禁令和运行限令。圣保罗可能是最新一个禁止优步的城市，但它仅仅是很多试图禁止或限制拼车服务的城市或国家之一。尽管有坏消息，但是我们还是能看到希望——要是拼车服务真的不可行的话，它的现状就不会是像现在这样并没有被当局想尽一切办法掐断在萌芽状态。在我看来，出租车司机、监管者和政客想要全面禁止拼车服务的尝试已经穷途末路了，同时，市场的反应也佐证了这个观点。去年不仅纽约的出租车收入狂跌，连纽约出租车牌照的价格也在去年两年内贬值了40%（总价大约是50亿美元）。尽管汽车销量并没有收到什么实质性的影响，但是有人担心在未来几年内汽车销量会下跌，因为很多人已经将拼车服务视为第二出行方式，甚至代替了自己的私家车成为首选的出行方式。

In my December post, I notedthe possibility that Uber could move into other businesses. The good news isthat it has delivered on this promise, offering  in Hong Kong and NewYork, and  in Los Angeles. The badnews is that it , partly because these aresmaller businesses (than ride sharing) and partly because the competition ismore organized. However, these new businesses have moved from just beingpossible to plausible, thus expanding the total market.

在我12月发表的文章中，我提到优步可能会转移到其他产业。好消息是我的预测确实应验了，优步在香港和纽约提供了物流服务，在洛杉矶提供了食物运输服务；坏消息是这些业务进展缓慢，有一部分的原因是因为比起个人拼车服务，上面提到的这些其他业务的市场实在是小的可怜。另一部分原因是因为这些产业的竞争更加有组织性。尽管如此，这些新兴业务还是从仅仅有可能出现发展到现在缓慢发展的状态，从而扩展了整体市场。

Bottomline: The total market for Uber is bigger than the urban car service marketthat I visualized in June 2014, and will attract new customers, and expand innew markets (with Asia becoming the focus), and perhaps even in new businesses.

概要：优步的完整市场比起我在2014年6月所预测的市内拼车服务市场要大得多，并且也会不断吸引新消费者，还会扩展新市场（主要针对亚洲市场），还有可能开拓新的业务领域。

Networking & Competitive Advantage (MarketShare and revenue sharing)

产业链&竞争优势（市场份额和收益共享）

The news on this front is moremixed. The good news is that the ride sharing companies have increased the costof entry into the market, with tactics such as paying large amounts to driversas sweeteners to sign up. In the US, , and some of the competitors from last year have either faded away orbeen unable to keep up with these two. Outside the US, the good news for Uberis that it is not only in the mix almost everywhere in the world but that Lyfthas, at least for the moment, decided to stay in its expansionchoices. 

关于这方面的新闻就更多元了。好消息是拼车服务公司提高了抢占新市场的成本，例如为了鼓励司机们注册公司会支付他们更多补贴。在美国，优步和Lyft已经成为了拼车服务市场的两大巨头，去年以来其他竞争者要么消失的无影无踪要么就与这两大巨头的市场份额相去甚远。在美国之外，不仅全球其他地区都像美国本土这样各种公司鱼龙混杂，而且目前Lyft在是否扩张这个问题上的决策是只专注做美国本土市场，这对优步来说无疑是个好消息。

The bad news for Uber is that,especially in Asia, , and that it is fightingagainst domestic ride sharing companies that dominate these markets,  in India,  in China and  in South East Asia. Someof the domestic company dominance can be attributed to these companies beingfirst movers and understanding local markets better, but some of it alsoreflects that the market is tilted (by , regulation and politics)towards local players. There is even talk, though it may be just that,that  to create a  that can share resourcesand users, though the news story, two weeks ago, that  adds heft to the thesis. To add to the mix, all ofthese ride sharing companies have been able to , reducing the significantcash advantage that Uber had earlier in the process.

坏消息是，拼车服务市场的竞争变得异常激烈，尤其是在亚洲，优步正在与当地市场的巨头打着一场恶仗，例如印度的Ola，中国的滴滴和快滴，东南亚地区的Grabtaxi等。当地拼车服务公司之所以能成为市场巨头很大程度上是因为他们先人一步攻占了市场并且对于当地市场更加了解，但在某种程度上也反映了这个市场被当地投资者、监管者和政客打上了本土产业的标签。有消息称这些本土的竞争者们会联合在一起打造一个“非优步”产业链来共享资源和客户。两周以前的一篇报道称滴滴快滴和Lyft已经建立了正式合作伙伴关系，这也说明上文并非空穴来风。为了使市场更加多元化，所有这些拼车服务公司需要更加高昂的估值资本以减少优步之前进行现金补偿所带来的影响。

No matter how this processplays out, one of the key numbers that will be (and in some cases is already)under pressure, due to this more intense competition, is the sharing of thegross billing, currently set at 80% for the driver and 20% for the ride sharingbusiness. In many US cities, where Lyft is challenging Uber most aggressively,Lyft is already offering drivers the opportunity to keep all of theirearnings, . While the threat of mutually assured destruction has kept both companiesfrom directly challenging the 80/20 sharing rule, it is only a matter of timebefore that changes.

不论这个过程将如何结束，在愈发激烈的竞争中，其中一个重要的数据将会发生变化（在某些案例中已经变了），这就是——毛收入的份额，目前分红的比重是司机80%，租车服务公司20%。在美国的很多Lyft和优步竞争激烈的城市，Lyft承诺司机有机会保留所有收入，前提是他们一周工作时间超过40个小时。这种做法虽同时避免了他们直接挑战80/20的分红规则，但按照这种鱼死网破的手段来看，改变分红规则也是迟早的事。

Bottomline: The ride sharing market is becoming competitive, but as costs of entryrise and the capital requirements become intense, it looks like this will be amarket with fewer players with larger regional networking benefits and morecapital.

概要：拼车服务市场的竞争逐渐白热化，但鉴于抢占市场的成本增加和资本密集度要求的提高，这个市场里的玩家会越来越少而区域相关链条产业的收益和资本会越来越多。

Coststructure

成本结构

This is the area where the most bad news has been delivered. Some of thepain has been from within the ride sharing business, as companies have taken tooffering larger and larger up-front payments to drivers to get them to switchfrom competitors, pushing up this component of costs. Much of the costpressure, though, has come from outside:

坏消息往往都来自于这个领域。一些压力来自于拼车服务公司内部，因为这些公司为了从竞争对手处挖更多的司机，他们承诺可以预付司机报酬，这就提高了一部分成本。然而大多数的成本压力还是来自于外部：

1.Drivers as partialemployees: Early in the summer, the  of the company, notindependent contractors. That ruling was further affirmed by a , and it is likely that therewill be other jurisdictions where this fight will continue. While ride sharingcompanies may be able to delay the effect, it is almost inevitable that at theend of the process, drivers for ride sharing companies , entitled to some (if notall) of the benefits of employees (leading to higher costs for ride sharingcompanies).

1.司机作为半员工：今年初夏的时候，加州劳动委员会决定将优步司机归属于该公司的员工行列，不再是独立的自由职业者。这项规定又进一步经过了法庭的决策认证——优步司机可以通过集体诉讼来起诉公司，同时似乎有可能这场关于权利的拉锯战会继续下去。然而拼车服务公司可能会推迟生效该项决策，因为在整个过程的后期阶段，司机们虽不可能成为全职员工但不可避免的会被当做半员工对待，同时享受全职员工的一些福利（这样就导致了公司要支出更加高昂的成本）。

2.The insurance blind spotwill be filled: The other shoe that is poised to drop is the cost of car insurance. Ridesharing companies in their nascent years have been able to exploit the holes inauto insurance contracting, often just having to add supplemental insurance tothe insurance that drivers already have. As both  and  try to fix this gap, itis very likely that drivers for ride sharing companies will soon have to buymore expensive insurance and that ride sharing companies will have to bear aportion of that cost.

2.填补保险方面的漏洞：另一个悬在这些公司头上的达摩克利斯之剑就是车险方面的花销。拼车服务公司在成立初期阶段往往只需要在司机原有车险的基础上增加一些补充险，将保险合同的坑越挖越大。时至今日监管者/立法者和保险公司也意识到了这个问题，决定采取措施来填补这个漏洞。以后拼车服务公司的司机很可能要投保费更加高昂的保险，而公司则要承担一部分保费。

3.Fighting the empire is notcheap: Earlier in this post, I noted that the status quo (the taxi businessand its regulators) was fighting back and that its cause was hopeless. However,the fight will still be expensive as the , as new fronts open up. 

3.与出租车行业帝国叫板需要巨大开支：上文中提到现在出租车行业和该行业的监管者已经开始反击。虽然出租车行业胜利的希望渺茫，但这场仗势必要在游说各方和法律诉讼费用方面产生巨大的新开支。

The evidence that costs are running far ahead of revenues again comes fromleaked documents from the ride sharing companies. This one, for instance, showsthat  and in , the contribution margins(the profits after covering just variable costs) by city not only reveal bigdifferences across cities, but are uniformly low (ranging from a high of 11.1%in Stockholm and Johannesburg to 3.5% in Seattle). 

根据一份从拼车服务公司内部泄露的文件来看，目前这些公司成本花销远远高于其收入。例如，该报告指出去年优步公司处于亏损的状态，各城市之间的贡献毛利（除去可变成本后的利润）虽然有很大差异，但出奇一致的则是这些城市的贡献毛利都极低（最高的是斯德哥尔摩和约翰内斯堡的11.1%，最低的则是西雅图的3.5%）

Bottom line: The costs of running aride sharing business are high, and while some of these costs will drop, asbusiness scales up, the operating margins are likely to be smaller than Ianticipated just over a year ago. 

概要：经营一家拼车服务公司的成本是十分高昂的，即使在某些方面能够节省一些成本，但随着企业规模的扩大，其营业毛利还是可能会比我一年前预测的要微薄少许。

CapitalIntensity and Risk

资本密集度和风险

The business model that Iassumed when I first valued Uber was minimalist in its capital investmentrequirements, since Uber not only does not own the cars driven by its driversbut invests little in corporate offices or infrastructure. That translated intoa high capital turnover ratio, with a dollar in capital generating five dollarsin additional revenues. While that basic business model has not changed, ridesharing companies are recognizing one of the downsides of this low capitalintensity model is that it has increased competition on other fronts. Thus, thehigh costs that Uber and Lyft are paying  can be viewed as aconsequence of the business models that they have adopted, where drivers arefree agents who are not bound to either company. 

当我第一次为优步估值的时候，我推断其商业模式是采取投资资本需求量的最低水平，因为优步的资产除了司机用到的汽车之外还有少许公司办公室及其他一些基础设施。这样换算成资本周转率就是一美元资本可以产生五美元的额外进账。然而这种基础商业模式不改变的话，拼车服务公司就要好好考虑一下这种低资本密集度模式带来的弊端了，也就是说他们必须要在其他方面提高竞争力。

For the moment, there is nosign that any of the ride sharing companies is interested in altering thedynamics of this model, by either upping its investment in infrastructure or inthe cars themselves, but this news story about Uber hiring away the  may be suggestive of changeto come.

目前来看，不管是提高基础设施方面的投入还是汽车本身方面的投入，还没有一家拼车服务公司表现出想要通过这种方式来改变该运行模式的意思，不过有报道称优步从卡内基梅隆大学挖到了机器人工程专业的人才，这可能意味着拼车服务业的变化要来了。

Bottom line: Ride sharing companieswill continue with the low capital intensity model, for the moment, but thesearch for a competitive edge may result in a more capital intense model,requiring more investment to deliver sustainable growth.

概要：目前来看，拼车服务公司未来可能会继续这种低成本密集度的商业模式，但是要想更有竞争优势就要去寻求一种成本更加密集的商业模式，投入更多资金来维持稳定的发展。

相关链接：

利益声明：本文内容和意见仅代表作者个人观点，作者未持有该公司股票，作者提供的信息和分析仅供投资者参考,据此入市，风险自担！

格隆汇声明：格隆汇作为免费、开放、共享的海外投资研究交流平台，并未持有任何关联公司股票。转载本文，请务必注明来源“港股那点事”及作者。

加入格隆汇

● 投稿给格隆汇。投稿邮箱：[e-mail]；

● 登录格隆汇官网（www.gelonghui.com）或格隆汇APP，注册、发文；

● 加入格隆汇各微信交流群。入群办法：添加微服妹妹的微信号“guruclub_011”，附上您的行业背景、投资经验等基本资讯；

● 参加格隆汇三大线下活动：汇说、汇路演、汇调研；

● 直接添加格隆个人微信公众号：guru-lama

● 联系电话：[phone]

● 业务洽谈：[e-mail]