Review Of Business Processes Of Uber Applying Sharing Economy Concept

Uber’s Business Process

The Uber app is used to book a cab and a pickup location is entered where the driver reaches within the minimum time. The company is present in more than 600 cities and has also received an equity funding of $22.2B, which has also influenced the shareholders or investors to make investments by making prior assumptions of the amount of revenue that may be generated after the achievement of liquidity (Uber.com 2018).

The business processes are managed with the use of information technology, which has facilitated the working together of various business portions as an integrated system for smooth flow and exchange of information, products and financial attributes. Uber is one of the major transportation services’ provider company that has transformed the entire taxi industry and with the management of proper business processes and suitable business models usage (Robson 2015). The business models are responsible for managing the business effectively, which has created convenience of the clients to use their smart phone and book their ride.

The business processes include managing the network activities in a structured manner with proper utilization of resources, information and facilities required to ensure successful business functioning. The business processes of Uber showed that achievement of goals has been possible and people have been quite accustomed with the use of this smart phone app to book cabs while the it is a cost effective way to achieve customer satisfaction too. The creation of value is possible with the source, i.e., the Uber App providing the client with a ride and thus the service is sold and the services are provided by delivering the client from the source to destination (Laudon and Laudon 2015).

The support activities, as stated in the value chain model are organizational infrastructure, development of technology, human resource management and procurement strategies while the primary activities of Uber are operations, inbound logistics, outbound logistics, marketing, sales and services. The drivers own the vehicle or rent those, considered as contractors and the clients use their smart phones to utilize the services. The inbound logistics are associated with the use of hardware components required to sustain business while the outbound logistics for Uber include the warehousing and distribution activities. For ride hailing, the outbound logistics is not much related though the wide network and internet based services, it is considered as value addition to the global taxi technology sector (Rainer et al. 2013). The company has been known for its social media marketing efforts, which has facilitated word of mouth promotions and the sales promotion, advertisements and public relations’ management have further contributed to the implementation of right marketing strategies and ensuring addition of value. Uber has gained competitive advantage with the high level of customer satisfaction achieved through delivery of great services integrated into the business model used. The clients provide feedbacks and ratings on a scale from 1 to 5, due to which, the driver need to maintain a clean car and deliver the best quality service to gain incentives as well (Kavadias, Ladas and Loch 2016).

The five forces are assessed to analyze the organization’s strategy implemented and these include threat of new entrants, threat of substitute products, rivalry among the competitors, bargaining power of suppliers and finally the buying power of consumers.

Threat of new entrants	Threat of substitute products	Bargaining power of suppliers	Buying power of consumers	Rivalry among the competitors
The threat of new entrants is medium because the operating of Uber does not require much effort or cost as it is based on how people bring cars, gain registration and work by driving based on their flexibility (Van Alstyne, Parker and Choudary 2016). Nowadays, clients look for convenient options to travel at lesser cost and Uber has redefined the way of transportation and with the emergence of new companies in the sector, the threat is medium.	The Threat of substitute products is also considerably high because of the similar business model used by other companies, which delivers similar experience and created convenience for the clients. There are other types of public transport that can also act as substitutes and create major threat for the company to obtain maximum market share and increase sales (Payne, Frow and Eggert 2017)	The bargaining power of suppliers is low because Uber, being a taxi service provider has ensured obtaining proper resources like the cars that are rented and then drove to meet the services’ criteria. In case one supplier is not satisfied with the benefits obtained, then there are other suppliers too, who can provide the necessary resources to facilitate the car services. Therefore, the bargaining power of suppliers is low.	The buying power of purchasers is high because of the stiff competition in the marketplace. The customers are price sensitive and thus they choose the value for money service, which might be available by switching to some other service provider. With the emergence of few more scandals, the negative mindset among the customers could further make them select alternatives for the ride hailing providers (Bashir and Verma 2017)	Rivalry among competitors is intense with the presence of other taxi service providers like Ola, Lyft, etc. in terms of market share. The business models used by other companies are nearly same, which can make Uber face competition fiercely and thus the industry rivalry is high.

Figure: Porter’s five forces analysis (Bashir and Verma 2017)

Figure: Database interaction layout (Laudon and Laudon 2015)

Construction suggestions mean necessary measures that are to be considered for improving the services delivered by Uber. Just as the other products and services for which the clients provide feedbacks, the same happens with Uber when the driver pickup and drop the client at the concerned location (Uber.com 2018). The non-optimal driver utilization could enable optimization of the speed of pickup and entire route followed to transfer the client from source to destination. Allowing for scheduled pickups can help in making the Uber services operationally feasible while the creation of loyalty programs could furthermore enable providing discounts and create positive mindsets among the clients (Laudon and Laudon 2015). Few constructive suggestions or recommendations are as follows.

• The performance review process, also known as the T3 B3 process of Uber is recommended to evaluate the strengths of the employees and identify the few things at bottom as well for making necessary improvements thereafter.
• The shifting of Uber’s culture is recommended as well for putting the major goals into the system that can be accessed by the staffs, employers and managers to work while holding each other accountable.
• The manager should be responsible for letting constructive advice be a part of the business process through consultation with the employees and obtaining their relevant views and opinions too.
• Uber should define new way of thinking by putting people at first and allow the employees to manage changes within the organization both internally and externally.
• The ratings provided on a scale from 1 to 5 and feedbacks regarding the services are used to make necessary changes and improve the driver experience, furthermore enhance the quality of services to a large extent
• To customize the experience, Uber could manage the Spotify account for leveraging the data and information about clients to deliver a new and seamless experience for keeping the clients satisfied.

Conclusion

The report was prepared to understand the business information systems consisting of the business processes and model used to ensure successful business functioning. The value chain model was devised to understanding the primary and support activities, which helped in maintaining great quality consistent services for the customers. The five forces were analyzed to implement a right marketing strategy, furthermore transformed the ways of transportation by overcoming the threats too. The company should leverage the information about customers and obtain their feedbacks as well for making improvements to the kinds of services delivered to the customers.

References

Bashir, M. and Verma, R., 2017. Why business model innovation is the new competitive advantage. IUP Journal of Business Strategy, 14(1), p.7.

Kavadias, S., Ladas, K. and Loch, C., 2016. The transformative business model. Harvard business review, 94(10), pp.91-98.

Laudon, K.C. and Laudon, J.P., 2015. Management information systems (Vol. 8). Prentice Hall.

Payne, A., Frow, P. and Eggert, A., 2017. The customer value proposition: evolution, development, and application in marketing. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 45(4), pp.467-489.

Rainer, R.K., Cegielski, C.G., Splettstoesser-Hogeterp, I. and Sanchez-Rodriguez, C., 2013. Introduction to information systems. John Wiley & Sons.

Robson, W., 2015. Strategic management and information systems. Pearson Higher Ed.

Uber.com. (2018). Uber – Earn Money by Driving or Get a Ride Now. [online] Available at: https://www.uber.com [Accessed 5 Oct. 2018].

Van Alstyne, M.W., Parker, G.G. and Choudary, S.P., 2016. Pipelines, platforms, and the new rules of strategy. Harvard business review, 94(4), pp.54-62.