Uber names COO as EU moves to regulate the service
SAN FRANCISCO — Uber named its first-ever chief operating officer Wednesday, a move designed to remake the upper ranks of the ride-hailing company as it grapples with fallout from its previous leadership.
Barney Harford, the former CEO of travel company Orbitz, takes up his position January 2 as second-in-command to recently installed CEO Dara Khosrowshahi, a onetime rival and colleague from both men's tenures in the online travel business.
Harford has been working at Uber as an advisor to Khosrowshahi since October, and will oversee global operations, marketing and customer support.
"Two months of 'try before you buy' as adviser left me impressed by the passion, smarts and thoughtfulness of the @Uber team, and hungry to spend more time with them," Harford tweeted.
Khosrowshahi was CEO of Expedia, which bought Orbitz in 2015, when he was selected last summer to replace cofounder and CEO Travis Kalanick.
Reeling from a February blog post by former engineer Susan Fowler that described a toxic workplace for women, Kalanick announced in March he would seek a COO. At that time, some reports said Uber's board wanted to appoint a woman.
Uber never named a candidate, and by June, Kalanick was forced out, putting the COO hunt on hold.
Newly at the helm, Khosrowshahi has been dealing with a list of issues stemming from the company's questionable business practices, which include paying off hackers to stay quiet about a large data breach and documents that allege the company hired ex-CIA agents to spy on its rivals.
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In Europe, Uber is contending with regulators that want to crack down on how the ride hailing company does business. London transportation officials have moved to ban the service from the city. One of Khosrowshahi's first orders of business as CEO was to fly to London and try and address key issues such as the way it reports serious criminal offenses.
On Wednesday, the European Union's highest court ruled that Uber should be considered not a tech company but a transportation service and each member state will have to decide how a peer-to-peer service such as Uber needs to regulated.
While the ruling would appear to deliver yet another hurdle to the once free-wheeling startup, Khosrowshahi tweeted that the ruling was "not a setback, since we've already changed our approach in the EU to follow transportation laws and work with professional drivers and we are going to keep talking with EU governments to enable affordable transportation services for millions more Europeans."
Uber, which considers its drivers part-time contractors, has spent the past six months rolling out a series of changes for drivers, including the ability for customers to tip in the app. But for many of these gig economy workers, the biggest bonus would be higher wages.
Uber's relationship with drivers reached its nadir earlier this year, when Kalanick was caught on a dash-cam video yelling at an Uber driver who was complaining to the CEO about how its lowered fares made it more difficult to make a living. Kalanick later apologized for his behavior and announced the COO search.
In joining Uber, Harford will be part of a new management team that is attempting to bring a more professional structure to a company whose valuation reportedly has dropped from $70 billion to around $50 billion in the wake of a largely scandalous 2017.
Harford is the second big hire under Khosrowshahi's tenure. In October, the new CEO hired Tony West, Pepsi's general counsel and a former Justice Department official, as Uber's new chief legal officer. Former Uber legal chief Salle Yoo left a week after Khosrowshahi signed on.
Over the course of its eight years in existence, Uber has pushed the boundaries of the law in its effort to dominate the ride hailing business. An internal program called Hell was used to spy on its chief rival Lyft, while a program called Greyball — both of which have drawn federal scrutiny — was used to try and dupe regulators looking into Uber's operations.
Last week, an explosive letter was released in connection with a case that pits Google-owned Waymo against Uber, whom the former claims stole its self-driving car trade secrets. Uber has denied that the light detection and ranging systems in its autonomous vehicles contain Waymo technology.
The 37-page letter, written by the lawyer for Richard Jacobs, Uber's former manager of global intelligence, contends that the ride hailing company employed former CIA agents to infiltrate Lyft's computers and eavesdrop on senior executive meetings.
The so-called Jacobs letter has become evidence in a criminal investigation being conducted by the Justice Department. U.S. District Judge William Alsup, who is overseeing the Waymo-Uber case, has recommended that federal prosecutors consider a criminal probe into Uber.
In a statement, Uber said the company had not yet substantiated all the claims, and that Uber's new leadership was committed to conducting business in an honest and fair manner going forward.
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