Uber CEO says changing employee benefits ‘is a risk we decided to take’
Uber CEO, Dara Khosrowshahi speaks during the “Intentional Equity in Sustainability” conversation at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Leaders’ Week in San Francisco, California, on November 15, 2023.
Andrew Caballero-Reynolds | AFP | Getty Images
Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi last week told employees “it is what it is” at a heated all-hands meeting after the company announced it would increase its in-office requirements and change benefits.
The ride-sharing company informed employees on April 28 that they will be required to come into the office three days a week, up from two, starting in June, CNBC reported. Uber also changed the eligibility for its month-long paid sabbatical benefit, raising the requirement from five years at the company to eight years. The company also informed some employees who had been previously approved for remote work that they would be required to start coming in.
Khosrowshahi defended the policy changes against feisty employees who peppered him with questions and criticism at the company meeting and on Uber’s internal forum, according to audio and correspondence obtained by CNBC.
“If you’re here for a sabbatical and this change causes you to change your mind, it is what it is,” Khosrowshahi told employees at the April 29 all-hands meeting. “I’m sorry about that. The reason we want you to be here is the impact on the company. The learning here. We recognize some of these changes are going to be unpopular with folks. This is a risk we decided to take.”
The clash inside Uber highlights the growing tension between tech workers and tech management. Workers for years were drawn to Silicon Valley for its idealistic values, perks and job security, but since 2022, tech companies have cut back on benefits and conducted on-going rounds of layoffs.
Google, for example, informed some employees who were previously approved for remote work that they needed to return to the office if they want to avoid getting caught in layoffs, CNBC reported last month.
Being in person more frequently is better for collaboration, innovation and company culture, Uber told CNBC in a statement.
“It’s hardly a surprise that not everyone was thrilled about changes to remote work and sabbatical policies,” the company said. “But the job of leadership is to do what’s in the best interest of our customers and shareholders.”
After Uber announced the changes in a memo last week, employees flooded the company’s internal Slido forum with questions and comments.
“The Slido essentially has been invaded by questions about the changes we’ve made,” Khosrowshahi said at the beginning of meeting, adding that the questions had been consolidated.
“How is five years of service not a tenured employee? Especially when burnout is rampant in the org,” a highly-rated comment from one employee said, adding that they had already paid for a trip for their upcoming sabbatical.
Khosrowshahi said Uber is a “Gen-AI powered company” that needs to be on its A game. He said employees should be more interested in learning and their impact on the company than on its benefits, which spurred more employee pushback.
Some questions asked if Uber made policy changes in hopes that it would force some people to quit.
“It has nothing to do in terms of a need to drive attrition or layoffs,” said Khosrowshahi, adding that the changes had nothing to do with cost cutting. “None of that is planned. The business is operating really, really well. But listen, good isn’t good enough for us. We have to be great as a company.”
Uber will report its first quarter financial results Wednesday.
Nikki Krishnamurthy, Senior Vice President, Chief People Officer of Uber.
Courtesy: Uber
After the all-hands meeting, Uber Chief People Officer Nikki Krishnamurthy sent out a memo saying some employee comments on the meeting broadcast “crossed the line into unprofessional and disrespectful.”
“That’s not O.K., and we will be speaking with the employees who made them,” Krishnamurthy wrote, according to the memo which CNBC viewed. “Through good times and bad, we are open with each other. Yet when we see behavior like this, it makes it harder to continue being open in the same way.”
Uber in 2022 established Tuesdays and Thursdays as “anchor days” where most employees must spend at least half of their work time in the company’s office and the rest of the week could be spent working remotely for “individual productivity,” according to a now-removed blog post.
“Our business also exists in the real world, on the streets of thousands of cities, and it’s important we stay connected to the places we serve,” Krishnamurthy wrote at the time.
On the company forum, several employees questioned the change to three days in-office, citing insufficient meeting rooms and work space, according to comments viewed by CNBC.
“It’s a challenge every anchor day to even find a place to sit with your team,” one employee comment said.
The goal of anchor days is “to get as many people in the office as possible,” Khosrowshahi said, adding that Uber will be keeping track of employee attendance.
Krishnamurthy addressed the concerns about office space at the company meeting, announcing that Uber is adding 700,000 square feet of office space between its San Francisco Mission Bay and Seattle offices. The additional space will go toward more meeting rooms and cafeterias, said Krishnamurthy, adding the retrofitting will be in construction through 2026.
WATCH: Uber raises in-office requirement to 3 days, claws back remote workers
Technology
StubHub IPO is back on for September after ticketing company delayed plans on tariff concerns
StubHub, the ticketing marketplace that spun out of eBay in 2020, has resumed its plans to go public and is now aiming to hold its IPO next month, CNBC has learned.
The company originally paused its IPO plans in April as the stock market was reeling from President Donald Trump’s “liberation day” tariffs. The decision came after StubHub submitted its prospectus in March indicating it would list on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker “STUB.”
StubHub now expects to kick off its IPO roadshow after Labor Day, Sept. 1, and make its debut later in the month, according to a source familiar with the matter who asked not to be named because the discussions are confidential.
The company didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
StubHub also filed an updated IPO prospectus on Monday. It reported revenue growth in the first quarter of 10% from a year earlier to $397.6 million. Operating income came in at $26.8 million for the period, after the company lost $883,000 in the year-ago period, but its net loss widened to $35.9 million from $29.7 million a year ago.
The IPO market has come to life in recent months after an extended dry spell due to high inflation and rising interest rates. A flurry of startups have made their public debuts, including rocket maker Firefly Aerospace, design software company Figma, crypto firm Circle and AI infrastructure provider CoreWeave. Bullish, the cryptocurrency exchange that counts Peter Thiel as an investor, also filed its IPO prospectus last month.
StubHub has been a longtime player in the ticketing industry since its launch in 2000. It was purchased by eBay for $310 million in 2007, but was reacquired by its co-founder Eric Baker in 2020 for $4 billion through his new company Viagogo.
The company had sought a $16.5 billion valuation before it began the IPO process, CNBC previously reported. StubHub didn’t provide an expected pricing range for its shares in the filing.
As it prepares to go public, StubHub is contending with hefty competition in the online ticketing market. In addition to Ticketmaster, which is owned by Live Nation, StubHub is up against secondary market companies, including Vivid Seats, SeatGeek and TicketNetwork
For the first quarter, StubHub reported gross merchandise sales of $2.08 billion, up 15% from a year prior. That was a slowdown from 47% expansion the previous quarter. StubHub said GMS, or the total value paid by buyers for tickets and fulfillment, builds in each quarter and that initial sales for major concert tours typically occur near the end of the year.
U.S. President Donald Trump (L) listens as Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang speaks in the Cross Hall of the White House during an event on “Investing in America” on April 30, 2025 in Washington, DC.
Andrew Harnik | Getty Images
President Donald Trump on Monday said that he initially asked Nvidia for a 20% cut of the chipmaker’s sales to China, but the number came down to 15% after CEO Jensen Huang negotiated with him.
The comments came after news broke over the weekend that Nvidia agreed to pay the federal government a 15% cut in return for receiving export control licenses that will allow it to once again sell the H20 chip to China and Chinese companies. Nvidia’s Huang visited Trump in the White House on Friday.
“I said, ‘listen, I want 20% if I’m going to approve this for you, for the country,'” Trump said in a press conference in Washington.
Trump said that Nvidia’s H20 is an “old chip that China already has” and is “obsolete.” He compared the H20 chip to Nvidia’s current fastest artificial intelligence chip, which is called Blackwell, and said that he wouldn’t allow those to be sold to China without significant downgrades, such as a 30% to 50% reduction in performance.
“The Blackwell is super-duper advanced. I wouldn’t make a deal with that,” Trump said, adding that it was possible to make a deal for a “somewhat enhanced in a negative way” version of Blackwell.
“That’s the latest and the greatest in the world. Nobody has it. They won’t have it for five years,” Trump said.
One reason for the U.S. export controls is fear that providing advanced chips to China could allow the foreign power to leapfrog the U.S. in AI capabilities. Many have said that could pose a threat to the national security of the U.S.
Trump said that China already has chips with some similar capabilities to the H20.
Huang has said that it is better for U.S. national security if Chinese AI developers use U.S. technology, and that denying them access to Nvidia chips would actually encourage the Chinese chip industry to develop and catch up.
“He’s selling a essentially old chip,” Trump said. “Huawei has a similar chip.”
The H20 is a Chinese-specific chip that has had its performance slowed down. It is related to Nvidia’s H100 and H200 chips that are used in the U.S. The H20 was introduced after the Biden administration implemented export controls on AI chips in 2023.
In April, the Trump administration said it would require a license to export the H20 chip, and in May, Huang said that “effectively closed” the market off to Nvidia. Huang said that Nvidia was expecting to sell about $8 billion in H20 chips in the July quarter before sales were stopped.
“While we haven’t shipped H20 to China for months, we hope export control rules will let America compete in China and worldwide,” an Nvidia spokesperson told CNBC on Monday.
Trump on Monday also said that Huang plans to visit him again to negotiate export licenses for the Blackwell chips.
“I think he’s coming to see me again about that,” Trump said.
A White House official confirmed to CNBC that AMD, the second-place AI chip maker, will also pay 15% to receive an export license for its China-focused AI chip, the Instinct MI308.
WATCH: Nvidia, AMD to pay U.S. 15% of AI chip sales in China to secure export licenses
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