Uber Founder, Travis Kalanick Steps Down From The Board Of Directors

Ride-hailing company, Uber announced today that its founder and former CEO Travis Kalanick is leaving the company's board of directors. According to a press release issued by the company, the founder, Kalanick will officially resign from the board as of December 31, to focus on his new business and philanthropic endeavours.

The 43-year-old ousted the ride-hailing firm's original chief executive within a year of its creation, but was himself forced to step down after 'six and a half years' later in 2017 after a number of scandals.

Kalanick, was forced out as Uber CEO and was eventually replaced by Dara Khosrowshahi through the intervention of its shareholders, with support of the board. The founder has been in the process of selling off his considerable ownership stake in the company through successive sales of his shares.  Last week, Kalanick sold around $383 million in shares and reduced his overall stake to less than 10%, per an SEC filing.  According to a report by Bloomberg, it looks like Kalanick has actually sold all his remaining stock, with the SEC filings to show up on the web likely after the Christmas holiday, per the FT. According to another report, in the past two months Kalanick has liquidated about $2.5bn (£1.9bn) worth of stock, which represents more than 90% of his earlier stake in the business.

Mr Kalanick in a statement issued by Uber said, "At the close of the decade, and with the company now public, it seems like the right moment for me to focus on my current business and philanthropic pursuits."

 

The sales of shares started when Uber's restriction on the sale of stock for private investors and employees expired six months after the company's IPO. At some in time, the founder, Kalanick owned shares that  totaled to the sum of 98 million in the company.

Investors of the company pressured him to step aside in the run-up to the company's flotation due to some series of controversies outlined below.

 

§  a report that another executive had obtained the medical records of a woman who was raped by an Uber driver in 2014, and then shared them with Mr Kalanick among others

§  hundreds of complaints from staff about harassment and bullying

§  a legal dispute with Google's parent company Alphabet over the alleged theft of trade secrets related to driverless cars

§  an argument between Mr Kalanick and one of Uber's San Francisco drivers over fares, which was filmed and released to the media

Mr Kalanick had also repeatedly clashed with regulators, which had helped Uber overcome and sometimes ignore restrictions that would have otherwise prevented it entering some markets.

 

Kalanick has since made a play in the on-demand food industry that his former company helped to kick-start with CloudKitchens, a startup that is focused on picking up cheap properties and turning them into restaurant operations without a counter, seating or walk-in service designed exclusively to fill demand for courier-based restaurant delivery apps.