20VC: Uber President on The Untold Uber Stories: Travis, China and Self-Driving | Why Autonomy Is Existential | How to Beat DoorDash to #1 in Food with Andrew MacDonald

**Andrew MacDonald** (0:00)
We're doing like 300 million trips a week. We were burning 52 million a week in China. We were competing in China with one hand tied behind our back. Autonomy is as bad as it's ever gonna be today, right? And every single day, it's gonna get better. In the end, distribution wins. We could do everything we do today with less people in five years because of the power of AI. No one's been at the company longer than me at this point.

**Harry Stebbings** (0:23)
This is 20VC with me, Harry Stebbings, and I'm so excited to welcome one of the greatest operators of the last two decades to the hot seat, Andrew MacDonald. He's the president and COO at Uber, where he leads all businesses' initiatives for the company across mobility and delivery. He is Uber's longest tenured active employee. Today, Uber is an absolute monster. They have a market cap of $160 billion, revenues of $52 billion in the full year of 2025 on over a quarter of a trillion in annual gross bookings. They have 200 million consumers that use the app monthly. This was a behind-the-scenes on Uber like we haven't seen before. Mac was one of the greatest operators that I've been fortunate enough to have on the show, and I think that really comes out in this discussion. But before we dive into the show today, founders face a different set of challenges at every stage of growth. For Sid Shait, co-founder and CEO of D-Matrix, JP Morgan delivered the guidance and expertise to help navigate what came next. He credits JP Morgan's high touch approach with supporting D-Matrix as it grew and expanded internationally. Whether you're in the early days or expanding into new markets, JP Morgan helps startups navigate complexity with real confidence, offering personalized guidance and deep sector expertise. Find out how JP Morgan helps founders at jpmorgan.com/growwithoutlimits.
JP Morgan is the bank of the innovation economy. While JP Morgan powers your finances, Asana keeps the work moving. Most companies have tried AI, most aren't seeing results. Not because AI doesn't work, it's because AI hasn't reached the workflows yet. That's the gap Asana is built to close. Asana is the operating system for human agent teams. Your easy button for AI productivity across every team. Ready-to-go AI teammates, pre-built for marketing, ops and IT. No prompt engineering, no setup. They show up where the work is happening, already onboarded, in your workflows, ready to deliver. With Asana, your whole company can work on the same plan, towards the same goal, whether you're a team of 10 or a team of 10,000. Asana, where humans and agents workflow together. Try it at asana.com. That's asana.com. While Asana aligns the road map, Base 44 helps you build faster. You have the idea, but with most AI tools, you hit a wall. The setup, the config, the gap between what you pictured and what you actually ship. Well, Base 44 is where that wall disappears. You describe it? Yeah, Base 44 builds it. Apps, websites, AI agents, real working products, built in minutes, using nothing but plain language. And it's all batteries included, the backend, the database, the authentication, the hosting, the heavy lifting is handled. So you just really stay in the flow. This doesn't just take the busy work off your plate, but it gives you an advantage and pushes you past what you thought you could build alone. So in this market, fast is the baseline. To win, you just have to be first. Base 44 is that edge, the move that skips the troubleshooting and gets you straight to the breakthrough. Build your next thing at base44.com. That's base44.com.
You have now arrived at your destination.
Mac, I am so excited for this, dude. I've wanted to make this happen and we've been DMing for like a long time. It's so good to do it in person.

**Andrew MacDonald** (3:50)
So great to be here. And you're right. I remember the first Twitter DM from you and I was a bit of a fan from afar, as you probably hear often, but great to be here now. I'm so glad to do it in person.

**Harry Stebbings** (3:59)
So I spoke to Dar before the show and I said, what's his superpower? He's been here for over a decade, whatever, 12, 13 years.

**Andrew MacDonald** (4:07)
14 years, maybe 15 in May. No one's been at the company longer than me at this point.

**Harry Stebbings** (4:12)
My God. I said, what's his superpower? And he said, oh, very simple. People really like him, but he is an execution machine and he is very good at driving people. And I suck at that. So seriously, how do you do that, but retain people liking you?