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Uber came to Southeast Asia with the Silicon Valley playbook. We came with local knowledge. Local knowledge won.
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We didn't win our Harvard business plan competition. The judges said the idea wouldn't work. We built it anyway and Uber surrendered the entire region.
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In Southeast Asia, the motorbike is the car. If your ride-sharing app doesn't work for motorbikes, you don't understand the market.
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Seventy percent of adults in our region don't have a bank account. We're not just a ride-hailing app — we're financial infrastructure for 700 million people.
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When Uber handed us their Southeast Asian business, it wasn't generosity. They were bleeding $700 million a year in the region and we weren't stopping.