Opinion | When ride-sharing titans like Uber and Didi collude, it is the customer who loses out

So Uber’s planning to exit Southeast Asia and leave the ride-sharing markets there to Singapore-based Grab. Like its exit from China in 2016, it’s a win for the ride-sharing behemoths and a loss for the public.

That didn’t take long. Once SoftBank Group completed its investment in United States-based Uber, adding it to its stakes in Grab, China’s Didi Chuxing, and India’s Ola, it seemed only a matter of time before it calmed down the cutthroat competition in cities where they overlap.

One might have thought there were more subtle ways for the companies to talk about how to increase prices in their shared markets while still “competing”. Price wars were hurting them all. Uber burned through some US$2 billion trying to take on Didi before it quit in 2016.

But increasing prices while pretending to compete requires a business and some actual work, plus it’s illegal in most places, which is all a lot more hassle than just leaving the other guy to his monopoly and going home with a piece of his suddenly more valuable equity.

Who’s going to stop that?

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After Uber settled a US federal lawsuit brought by Alphabet subsidiary Waymo last month, Uber chief executive Dara Khosrowshahi “apologised”, saying: “As we change the way we operate and put integrity at the core of every decision we make, we look forward to the great race to build the future. We believe that race should be fair – and one whose ultimate winners are people, cities and our environment.”