20VC: Uber President on The Untold Uber Stories: Travis, China and Self-Driving | Why Autonomy Is Existential | How to Beat DoorDash to #1 in Food with Andrew MacDonald
episodePreviously titled “20VC: Uber President on Budgeting AI at Uber: How AI Helps and Hurts Uber | Why Autonomy Is Existential | How to Beat DoorDash to #1 in Food | The Untold Stories of Travis Kalanick, Dara Khosrowshahi and China with Andrew MacDonald” — renamed by the publisher on Aug 17, 2026
The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
1h 6m
1 speaker
8 chapters
transcribed 1 month ago
Transcript
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How did Andrew “Mac” McDonald survive the Travis era and become Uber’s longest‑tenured executive?
We're doing like three hundred million trips a week. We were burning fifty-two million a week in China. We were competing in China with one hand tied behind our back. Autonomy is as bad as it's ever gonna be today, right? And every single day it's gonna get better. In the end, distribution wins. We could do everything we do today with less people in five years because of the power of AI. No one's been at the company longer than me at this point.
This is 20 VC with me, Harry Stabbings, and I'm so excited to welcome one of the greatest operators of the last two decades to the hot seed, Andrew McDonald. He's the president and COO at Uber, where he leads all businesses' initiatives for the company across mobility and delivery. He is Uber's longest tenured active employee. And today, Uber's an absolute monster. They have a market cap of 160 billion. Revenues of 52 billion in the full year of 2025, on over a quarter of a trillion in annual gross bookings. They have 200 million consumers that use the app monthly. This was a behind the scenes on Uber like we haven't seen before. Mac was one of the greatest operators that I've been fortunate enough to have on the show, and I think that really comes out in this discussion.
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You have the idea, but with most AI tools. You hit a wall. The setup, the config, the gap between what you pictured and what you actually ship. Well, base 44 is where that wall disappears. You describe it? Yeah. Base 44 builds it. Apps, websites, AI agents, real working products, built in minutes using nothing but plain language. And it's all batteries included. The back end, the database, the authentication, the hosting. The heavy lifting is handled. So you just really stay in the flow. This doesn't just Take the busy work off your plate, but it gives you an advantage and pushes you past what you thought you could build alone. So in this market, fast is the baseline. To win, you just have to be first. Base 44 is that edge, the move that skips the troubleshooting and gets you straight to the breakthrough.
Build your next thing at base44.com. That's base44.com. You have now arrived at your destination. Mac, I am so excited for this dude. I've wanted to make this happen. And we've been DMing for like a long time. It's so good to do it in person.
So great to be here. And you're right. I remember the first Twitter DM from you, and I was a bit of a fan from afar as you probably hear often. But uh great to be here now and so glad to do it in person. So I spoke
to Dara before the show and I said, What's his superpower?
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
How did Andrew “Mac” McDonald survive the Travis era and become Uber’s longest‑tenured executive?
0:00–5:07
2
What criteria does Uber use to decide which products belong in the Uber One membership?
5:07–11:13
3
How does Uber decide which new products to pursue and allocate resources to them?
11:13–15:17
4
What is Uber’s strategy to reach 500 million users and increase rides per user?
15:17–19:19
5
Why did Uber divest its autonomous‑vehicle program and focus on its core business?
19:19–23:02
6
How do India and Brazil affect Uber’s timeline for rolling out autonomous rides?
23:02–28:30
7
What key lessons did Mac learn from Travis Kalanick about money, competition and company culture?
28:30–34:43
8
How is AI being used at Uber to improve efficiency and what is the outlook for AI budgeting?
34:43–1:06:35
Speakers
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