In a plausible future…
(Seen in an interview in The Exponential Times.)
The Unstoppable Growth of Takemethere
Take me there (stylized as Takemethere), is an autonomous transport company that appeared out of nowhere six months ago.
During that time, it’s already handling 30% of all autonomous trips in the United States. If it keeps growing at the same pace, it could reach 80% of trips by the end of this year.
We tried to contact them, but they told us they still don’t have a communications department and that the CEO currently doesn’t have time to speak with us.
However, we managed to talk to Robert, a founder and shareholder, who told us why he left the company so abruptly and answered all our questions:
Exponential Times: What makes Takemethere special? Where did the idea come from?
Roberto: The idea came from a review of business models that a few of us did together for a project in business school.
We studied several companies across different sectors, including one in autonomous transport. We looked closely at its business model and had to figure out what its costs and prices for customers were.
We realized that if you kept expenses lower in certain areas, you could operate at a much lower cost per trip than what was being done at the time. That meant it was possible to create a company that offered rides at less than half the price current transport companies were charging.
ET: So, a low-cost version of today’s autonomous transport?
R: Exactly.
The key was mainly the purchase price of the vehicles and reducing the company’s main expenses.
For instance, there’s software now that lets you run a complete autonomous transport business by paying a monthly subscription. So the main investment was only the cars, since the software is paid month to month.
Once we realized that could work, eight of us got together, each put in fifty thousand dollars, and we kicked off this venture.
ET: You went from starting small to having a fleet of half a million vehicles incredibly fast. How did you get the cars so quickly?
R: Several global operators were renewing their fleets with more expensive new cars. We bought a lot of used vehicles from different operators in different countries and brought them into the United States.
That allowed us to get a lower purchase price per car. Even though maintenance is a bit higher because these cars already have a lot of mileage, it’s worth it.
We’ve been putting the cars into service under the Takemethere brand as we clean and prepare them.
ET: You saw the opportunity and seized it. How is it that the companies who sold you the cars, who do the same kind of business, didn’t realize what you were planning? I’m guessing they wouldn’t have sold you the cars otherwise.
R: We created many companies, one or several in each country where we made purchases. Each company bought cars for what seemed like different uses.
Once we’d bought as many as we wanted, we started shipping them to the United States.
Not until after everything was up and running did Takemethere officially purchase all those companies.
ET: So it was a strategy they didn’t see coming, right?
R: Shhh…
ET: Was it complicated to transport them?
R: The ones we bought here arrived on their own at our facilities, just like those we bought in Canada and Mexico.
For the ones in Asia and Europe, we initially thought about having them come through a tunnel under the Bering Strait1. But we realized that wasn’t feasible, so we used car-carrier ships to bring them over.
ET: And where did you get the money to buy so many cars?
R: We took out a lot of loans, haha. It was very risky.
Now that we have revenue from customers, almost all of it is going into further expansion.
ET: How did you get so many customers so fast?
R: First, we went after people who really care about pricing—young people. We ran campaigns to get them started on the service.
We also used fast-growth referral models. When a customer signs up, they pay a one time subscription fee. They get that entire amount back if they refer twenty new customers who use the service.
This way, either we keep the fee if they don’t refer anyone, or we gain new customers. If they don’t refer anyone, we still remain cheaper than the competition because that initial fee is only charged once at sign-up.
We’re already expanding to other types of customers and trying to bring in new ones every day.
ET: Other autonomous transport companies are making all sorts of changes. Any comment on that?
R: Some companies have really struggled since Takemethere showed up.
A few have offered to merge with us because they can’t compete on price. We’ve bought some others to get specific types of vehicles. And in other cases they have sold us part of their fleet so they can serve customer segments we’re not interested in, for example, for only offering larger vehicles or vehicles for special occasions.
ET: So, why did you leave the company?
R: It’s been two hectic years, but people only see these six months of operation. I’d love to stay, but right now I have some personal family matters I need to deal with.
ET: We’ve heard you’re still a shareholder and that each of you put in fifty thousand dollars. Takemethere is now worth several billion dollars.
R: Yes, the valuation is huge. In fact, there are people who want to buy us, although Takemethere isn’t for sale at the moment.
ET: Congratulations on Takemethere’s success, and thanks for talking with us! What do you plan to do with the money you’ve made?
R: Thank you so much. I’m thinking of launching another idea…
ET: We’ll be watching!
The Background
At any time, it’s possible for a new company to enter a mature market—where the existing businesses are big and well-established—even if it seems impossible. And it’s also possible to revolutionize it.
The time it takes can get shorter and shorter, even when there’s the production or use of physical objects, although it might not seem so. That’s because the exponential effect still applies, even if to a lesser degree than in purely digital services.
We can see this in a past example—electric cars—and then look at Takemethere in a plausible future.
Electric Cars
Maybe you didn’t know, but for several years in the early 1900s, there were electric taxis operating in certain US cities. (This reference is intentionally vague—look it up if you want more details.)
During that era, electric vehicles competed with steam-powered and combustion vehicles. Electric technology was much simpler but had less range, while combustion was more complex but easier to refuel.
More recently, when the combustion-engine market was already very mature, a new competitor entered by making electric supercars.
The strategy was to make expensive cars first, because you make more profit per car, and producing fewer high-end cars is easier than producing a larger number of cheaper ones. Over time, that brand went on to produce more units of increasingly cheaper cars.
Even though it seemed unfeasible with the battery technology at the time, the market shifted over about 15 years.
The car market was mature, and electrification changed the game.
Now the leaders are different.
The Takemethere Case
In this Exponential Times article, we see something similar—only faster.
In a mature market for passenger transport via autonomous vehicles, a brand-new competitor suddenly appears. And the rules of the game change.
In this case, they used a strategy to take over the market, grow extremely fast, and oust their competitors.
They buy up many used cars from existing companies and use them to offer a lower price to their customers.
They also gather cars from all around the world in a single country to create a larger volume than any competitor, making it really tough for others to keep up.
Those who react quickly and adapt survive—others don’t.
Overall, we’ll see that due to the possibilities of the exponential era in which we live, market changes can be just as rapid, even when physical objects like cars are involved.
In the article’s example, Takemethere can expand as fast as they can clean and prep their cars for customers.
Their competitors buy new cars, which take time to manufacture. Takemethere buys cars that already exist and cleans them up to put them into service—much faster.
Plus, all the necessary software to run the company is already out there, and they can pay for it monthly.
So they start with younger customers and then move on to other segments, while steadily cutting into their competitors’ sales.
Remember, the companies that serve you will change faster and faster.
Pay attention!
Now is the time to ask your favorite LLM: What’s been said about the tunnel between Siberia and Alaska? Thanks!