There have long been reports that Uber is thinking about going public. The company has had a rough year which ended up in a change in leadership and as Uber looks to revamp its image and change how it does business, it’s now talking about the possibility of going public rather openly. Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi revealed at the New York Times’ Dealbook conference today that an Uber IPO can possibly take place in 2019.
Dara Khosrowshahi took the CEO job from Uber founder Travis Kalanick who stepped down from the top job earlier this year. Khosrowshahi has previously said that his plans for Uber include an early IPO.
He has now talked about this possibility in more detail. Khosrowshahi had previously said that the Uber IPO could happen in the next 18 to 36 months. He now says that it’s a possibility in 2019.
He added that as long as Uber remains private, it “has all the disadvantage of being a public company, with the spotlight on us, with none of the advantages.”
His stance on this is completely opposite to that of Kalanick who pushed to keep Uber private for as long as possible and didn’t see any urgency in tapping the public markets for cash.
The specifics about the IPO will obviously come much later when there’s a concrete roadmap, but this goes to show that the new CEO is going to do things his own way.
Filed in . Read more about Uber. Source: techcrunch