Uber purchases on the net food items delivery pioneer Postmates for $2.65 billion

Postmates pioneered food delivery in 2011, but is a distant fourth in the US market to DoorDash, GrubHub and Uber’s very own Eats expert services. With each other, however, Uber Eats and Postmates will be next in the market place right after DoorDash, which still retains a large lead.

uber is buying postmates. as a element-time courier who functions for each, this is terrible news. though both equally are staunch anti-worker providers, much less and more substantial players implies even much less employee leverage against system capitalists. with dwindling options, we’ll be exploited even more harshly

— wilfred chan (@wilfredchan) July 6, 2020

Both of those Uber and Postmates are hard cash-detrimental operations, with Uber on your own obtaining lost $2.9 billion in Q1 2020 for the reason that of the COVID-19 disaster. Food shipping businesses, which depend on non-full-time “gig workers,” are challenging to inform aside from a buyer standpoint other than pricing. As this kind of, greater fish are swallowing scaled-down ones in buy to control expenditures and pricing — to the prospective detriment of dining establishments, consumers and, significantly, staff.

“As a section-time courier who performs for both [Postmates and Uber Eats] this is undesirable news,” wrote journalist and gig worker Wilfred Chan on Twitter. “While both are staunch anti-employee organizations, fewer and even larger players implies even less worker leverage from platform capitalists. With dwindling choices, we’ll be exploited even more harshly.”