[goneubering]

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/uber-green-competitor-taking-world-230000455.html

Meredith Taylor
April 6, 2020, 4:00 PM PDT

As the global economy faces $1 trillion in damages within five years because of climate change, the explosive ride-sharing business is facing heightened scrutiny as one of the transportation sector's biggest new polluters.

So, when a group of tech innovators with a vision of environmental and social responsibility from Ontario's 'Silicon Valley' unleashed the next generation of CO2-reduced ride-sharing, Wall Street is likely to pay attention.

Ride-sharing 2.0 is being redefined by Facedrive (TSX:FD.V), which now offers riders something they can't get from Uber or Lyft: A carbon-offset way to share a ride.

Facedrive's business model puts the "people and planet first", and that means planting trees and offsetting the CO2 for every ride hailed. The company's innovative, state-of-the-art, in-app algorithm calculates estimated CO2 emissions for each car journey and allocates a monetary value to the local organizations to plant trees. Last year alone, in partnership with Forest Ontario, they planted over 3,500 trees in their soft launch phase.

For the first time in ride-sharing history, a company allows its riders to choose between EVs, hybrids and traditional cars. It's a choice no one's ever given to consumers--all without customers having to pay a premium.

Trees and the New Investing Mega-Trend

There are three realities that have come together to position Facedrive to change ride-sharing forever.

First, ESG (environmental, social and governance) investing isn't just a fad anymore--it's minting millionaires and billionaires. It's in high demand, and it's pressuring companies to make major changes. It's the ethical squeeze of the century.

From Jeff Bezos' $10-billion commitment to a Global Earth Fund to BlackRock CEO Larry Fink, we're now seeing major ESG assets under management. BlackRock will increase its ESG assets from $90 billion to $1 trillion within a decade.

The second reality is that ride-sharing is already huge, and set for explosive growth in our "sharing" economy. The global market is already worth $235 billion, according to Canada's commercial banking giant, Scotiabank, which has jumped on the Facedrive bandwagon as it embraces ride-sharing 2.0.

 

[Another Uber Driver]

The initial concept of UberX was a fleet of hybrids. In the early days of the first cities where it launched, it was all hybrids, with the idea that it would add pure electrics as the technology advanced. "Do your part for the planet, ride UberX".

In SF and other early cities, the customer usually got a Prius or Fusion or whatever the Honda hybrid was. At some point, money grubbing took over plus Lyft entered the market with "suggested donations" which resulted in the UberX/Regular Lyft of to-day.

 

[goneubering]

The initial concept of UberX was a fleet of hybrids. In the early days of the first cities where it launched, it was all hybrids, with the idea that it would add pure electrics as the technology advanced. "Do your part for the planet, ride UberX".

In SF and other early cities, the customer usually got a Prius or Fusion or whatever the Honda hybrid was. At some point, money grubbing took over plus Lyft entered the market with "suggested donations" which resulted in the UberX/Regular Lyft of to-day.

Very interesting. Things haven't worked out the way people thought.

I'd never heard of Facedrive until today so I wasn't sure it was a real company until doing some searches. Sure is a dumb name for a company.