12 Experts on the Uber IPO and the Ridesharing Company’s Future

"Ryan Calo, University of Washington law professor

I think about the privacy-policy ramifications. I think about the effect on the driver of the architecture of Uber’s system. So from my perspective, the IPO could be a good thing. Because it broadens the stakeholders to stockholders more generally. It opens the company up to a wider range of stakeholders having some say over what the company does. So number one, while shareholders are hardly a proxy for the average resident or driver, there might be some folks among the investing community who try to hold Uber accountable. Second of all, obviously Uber has to disclose more about what it’s doing, what its risk factors are. There will be greater transparency, they’ll have to file with the SEC. I don’t think any of this stuff will be the panacea. There’s horrible behavior by publicly traded companies, going back decades. But those two levers are there that weren’t there before."