San Francisco (AFP)

Uber ensures that the recovery is well underway thanks to deliveries and the gradual exit from the pandemic in some countries, but supply and demand for trips with drivers remain weak, and the transport platform continues to have to defend its business model contested.

The world leader in chauffeured passenger car (VTC) reservations said on Wednesday that passenger trips had started to pick up in the first quarter, even though gross bookings remained down 38% in this segment over one year.

"We are finally seeing light at the end of the tunnel, with vaccinations on the rise, infection rates falling and travel restrictions lifted," said Dara Khosrowshahi, head of the California group, at a conference telephone with analysts.

The company saw its delivery services take off during lockdowns in 2020 while its "mobility" branch plunged.

This trend continued during the first quarter: gross travel bookings (mainly receipts before deduction of taxes, tolls or various driver remuneration) decreased by 38% in one year to 6.8 billion dollars, while those of shipments jumped 166% to 12.5 billion.

The app has some 98 million active consumers at least once a month, up from 103 million a year ago.

- Back to the wheel -

"Uber's business is on track," said Eric Haggstrom, of the eMarketer firm.

"Unlike Lyft (its American competitor, editor's note), their user base has almost returned to its pre-pandemic level, thanks to the good health of their take-out delivery service."

He also notes the progress of other delivery services (food shopping, alcohol, etc.), but stresses that the recovery will depend on the desire of people to travel again and that of the drivers to get behind the wheel.

Uber announced bonuses for its American drivers a month ago, hoping to speed up their return.

In all, the group reduced its net losses, usually abysmal, to 108 million dollars, thanks to the sale of ATG, its division developing and commercializing technologies of autonomous driving, for 1.6 billion.

Last year, at the same time, they were 2.9 billion.

The group achieved 2.9 billion dollars in turnover, heavily reduced by provisions of 600 million dollars, necessary to grant its British drivers the status of salaried workers.

The subject of the status of drivers has not finished weighing on the prospects of the company, which has never managed to turn a profit.

In the United States, Uber succeeded last year in countering a Californian law which was also to force companies in the "gig economy" (task economy) to reclassify their drivers as employees.

- "No one size fits all" -

But the Biden administration has said it is in favor of drivers and delivery people being granted salaried status.

On Wednesday, the Ministry of Labor canceled a regulation adopted in early January under Donald Trump, which made it more difficult for workers (economy of "odd jobs"), to claim this status.

"We remain committed to ensuring that employees are clearly and correctly recognized when they are, in fact, employees, so that they receive the protections provided," US Secretary of Labor Marty Walsh said in a statement. .

Tony West, Uber's chief legal officer, said he saw it as an "opportunity for dialogue" with the government, to "find a solution that gives workers the protections they deserve while preserving the innovation that gives them flexibility. they want ".

In 2020, Uber and other companies in the industry spent more than $ 200 million to promote their alternative to California law, which upholds the independent status of drivers while providing them with some financial compensation.

They won with 58% of the vote, and Tony West is now promoting this model.

"There is no one size fits all," he explained.

"But there are solutions to this problem, to be found depending on the location."

In California as in New York - where the municipality voted a minimum wage that came into effect in 2019 - Uber has deferred its additional costs on the prices paid by passengers and consumers.

"We have not seen any impact on demand," said Nelson Chai, the group's chief financial officer.

© 2021 AFP