tv Squawk Alley CNBC March 1, 2019 11:00am-12:00pm EST
11:00 am
11:01 am
good friday morning. welcome to "squawk alley." i am jon fortt joining me, contessa brewer, andrew ross sore kin carl is on assignment, so is morgan brennan at the kennedy space center we're going to hear from her in just a moment. >> all right let's begin with tech stocks major indexes off initial highs, nasdaq on pace for a tenlt straight week of gains first time in 20 years since christmas eve, up nearly 20%. faang stocks fueling the rally, all five off to a strong start for the year joining us where to find value, tom forte, and aaron kessler gentlemen, good to see you both. tom, we regained some ground we lost last fall heading into spring, what drives tech >> sure, you look at in
11:02 am
particular for amazon and for apple, it's about maintaining strength in the u.s. consumer and then the cloud computing effort for amazon and then for apple it's really about finding new opportunities beyond the iphone but i do think that, you know, 2019 you're still looking at good up side, at least for amazon and apple on the cloud computing efforts for amazon, and apple's ability to find opportunities beyond the iphone. >> aaron, where are you looking for continued growth drivers >> the top pick remains albuquerqu despite slowdown concerns, valuation is attractive, less than 15 times in the core business that's the topic continue to remain bullish on amazon, driven by strength in cloud as well as we think continued operating leverage in the business, less so than we
11:03 am
saw in 2018. and facebook, fundamentals remain strong despite the privacy concerns there's few places advertisers can spend this much besides google and facebook. we believe combined they get 80% plus of incremental dollars. >> is this based on multiple expansion in terms of how you think of value >> yeah. it is a combination, less so for amazon, but i would say for facebook, alibaba, you can get something while they're 20 times earnings and growing 20% plus revenue growth historically undervalued for large cap growth at these rates. >> tom, i was a little surprised not that autodesk did well after the bell yesterday but their commentary on strength across a bunch of different reasons, not that you cover autodesk specifically, but that's a company that deals with building, has insight into manufacturing and trends there
11:04 am
should we take that perhaps as a signal that in tech, slowdowns that we hear about aren't necessarily effecting all consumers the same >> i think the general environment for tech is still quite favorable, to the extent you have a lot of economies across the globe doing well. the u.s. continues to do well. and you've seen some companies in particular do a good job navigating brexit related challenges in the uk while there are enough reasons to be concerned about as far as some challenges i think that this is still fertile soil for tech and with low interest rate environment and new potential issuance later this year, still a good time to be in tech. >> aaron, you mention a potential deal with china. if that includes resolution on patents and copyrights and forced technology transfer, does that move the needle for technology in china for some
11:05 am
tech companies to go in and follow apple's moves in terms of making hay while the sun shines there? >> it is to be determined. that could open up the market for softer companies, historically china hasn't invested in software one of the reasons we like alibaba is they're almost becoming a software like player in china as well, they don't invest a lot outside of china software could open up the market but another reason to like alibaba, could be a key software player in the china market. >> it kind of left amazon in the dust, alibaba. i was interested at your price target, there's a wide range tom, you have a price target on amazon of 2450, aaron, my notes say 1960 talk to me about the difference in range tom, what do you think >> basically aaron eluded to this, big drivers for amazon today are the most profitable
11:06 am
businesses, not only cloud computing but third party retail and advertising. i do think investors are somewhat getting used to the new amazon, which is much more robust profit growth and potentially slower sales growth. on the strength of those three items, i think that's why the price target is 2450 we're a big believer that long term margin will be higher than today. >> aaron >> yeah, i would say i think we're both positive. probably the difference is we're both bullish on the cloud business we have seen a slowdown in core consumer growth. unit growth more in mid teens recently we have taken a slightly more conservative multiple on the retail business which has slowed that might be explaining the difference especially with issues with india recently, might be some questions around how big amazon can be with increasing regulations there. >> guys, we covered a lot of
11:07 am
ground thank you. >> thank you and spacex scheduled to launch an uncrewed test flight in a few hours morgan brennan is at the kennedy space center in florida. morgan, what should we expect? >> reporter: hey, jon, that's right. we're on the edge of a new era for human space travel spacex one of the companies poised to usher that in. this mission for nasa, if all goes according to plan from the launch behind me, it will mark a major milestone not only for the commercial space flight industry but for america. coming up on "squawk alley," we're going to give you details about the mission, how it fits into a broader u.s. space strategy and i'm going to give you details on the passenger that will be traveling at blast off on that falcon 9 rocket later tonight. >> is it you, morgan
11:08 am
>> reporter: it is not me. it is not me but i'll give you one hint her name is ripley and that's in reference to a famous older movie that involves space travel more on that coming up >> i see where you're going there. morgan, thanks. speaking of, tesla announcing news yesterday evening that they're going to introduce the long promised $35,000 model 3 while adding all sales of tesla vehicles would be moving online. shares of tesla down about 7% this morning on that >> what's your take? >> i mean, it is hard to know what to pay attention to with this company for me. there's all the justification around why the standard battery wasn't coming for awhile, need for profitability, then musks
11:09 am
tweets that draw attention on the good side but run afoul of people's opinions at the sec on the other side i don't know >> i think it could be an inflection point revolution, i don't know if it will be for tesla, but i think it will be a political issue. i think one day, and it is already starting certain places, in this case you have to buy the car and then test it out, and if you hate it, you can give it back, but it will cost you $35,000. >> i thought that was a strange thing to do. >> i think people in the future are going to call up a dealer, do something on the phone, somebody will show up with a car at your home you will then jump in the car, take it for a couple of laps, give it back then you might do it with three or four cars it will be car buying as a service on demand. >> but he said hey, you could buy our car, drive it for 700 miles, and give it back. gave me an idea, why would you rent a car for the weekend when
11:10 am
you could buy a tesla and take it for the weekend. >> you have to wire them $35,000, i promise it will take awhile to wire it back >> that buying strategy may work if you know exactly what you want >> there could be a float play, a play on a float. pay the 35 grand, keep it a week we'll see. still to come, a lot more on "squawk alley. several prominent new york city business leaders and other officials urging jeff bezos to reconsider the h q2 decision one of the supporters, general atlantic's bill ford sits down to talk about it next, the company partnering with amazon, voice enabled blood pressure mitinonorg system we're back with that in a moment and more -driverless cars... -all ground personnel...
11:11 am
11:13 am
welcome back to "squawk alley. alphabet, amazon vying to be in the next tech. starting to launch a blood pressure monitoring system joining us, glen tilmann we're thrilled to have him join us they partner with corporate clients to address chronic costs for diabetes, blood pressure, mental health. tell us about the new evolution, what you're doing, how it is going to change things the real move from tech across
11:14 am
the board, tech to health care, a lot of people trying to get in this space, glen. >> there are great to be on this among. livongo is focused on how you help people with chronic conditions lead better lives we're making it easier to stay healthy. the new announcement with amazon, using amazon technology allows people to check blood pressure at home, use a cellular connection that's a.m. utomatic send it wherever they want, to the cloud, call it cuff to cloud. the nice thing is they're using voice technology which is the most natural way to communicate with any technology. in health care it is not about the technology, it is how we use it to make it easier for people to stay healthy. it is a great development. >> to put a fine point on it, is this an exclusive deal with amazon, hoping to do something like this with google or
11:15 am
somebody else? >> right now we're working with amazon this product itself is amazon lex based. and what we're doing is attacking what is the largest, we think the most pressing problem in america and health care today, 180 million people with chronic conditions. and we'll use any technology to make it easier for those people to stay healthy. that's where the challenge is in the health care system for people today, despite all of the technology it has been more confusing, more costly, more complex than ever before we want to use technology to make it easier. >> you say that they're sorting the signal from the noise. explain for viewers how this is tirch. how the technology will nudge people to pay attention to the right signals, maybe give a sense how your own son's type
11:16 am
one diabetes inspired you to pursue this path >> well, there's a lot of questions in there my son sam was diagnosed with type one diabetes and i was amazed how hard it was, how hard we made it for people to stay healthy. i wanted to use my background in software and technology to start a company to make it easier. what we're doing today is using the health signals from people's body, whether it be their blood sugar, a 1 c, whether it be blood pressure, even with recent acquisition of a company called my strength that's in behavioral health, we're using all the signals from your own body to put that information to the cloud, run it through our engine that does the analysis, and delivers back a personalized solution that works for you. it is a lot like think of it as netflix or amazon but for health because we're using our ai
11:17 am
engine to analyze data, interpret it, deliver it back to you, iterate, see if it works. and we've never seen that in health care. we love it in every other consumer industry, now we're bringing it to health care. >> how do you get paid >> we are getting paid by a variety of folks, primarily by large self-insured employers that want to be sure people are taken great care of. we're working with half the fortune 50, about 700 different clients, they pay a monthly fee. what's beautiful about it is, for example, if you have diabetes, we give unlimited free strips there's no cost to the person with diabetes because we want to eliminate all of the hurdles for them to stay healthy their companies bought into the fact that their people not just like it but love it.
11:18 am
we deliver measurable clinical results. lower blood pressure, lower a1c, higher satisfaction. >> that's the goal, especially if you're an employer and want to be sure you are maximizing health efficiencies. we had a story about getting sensitive private health related information from app developers. how do you ensure that amazon is not getting information about our health that it shouldn't get? >> the first thing is we empowered the health consumer, what we call our members they make every decision about where their data goes. they decide who it goes to, who gets access to it. the great news is all of the large innovative employers in many cases don't want to see the data we're partnering with the largest pbms and with payers sometimes the employer will say
11:19 am
just work with the payer we don't want to know who has diabetes, depression work with them we'll send information directly to the e-mail address or to the employee's home, so it is all done confidentially. we protect that confidentiality. it is part of the trust we build with our members >> we have to go i have to ask one tiny quick question which is this do you think long term given how much we put on facebook and other things, that even your health records, even your health information, people are more open about their own health and health problems publicly i wonder whether five or ten years ago this conversation we are having about health we won't be having. >> i don't think we'll be having it i think people will control the access to their information, they'll share it with the people that can help them stay healthier, and again, the goal, how do we empower those people with the technology. >> glen, appreciate the time
11:20 am
11:21 am
what do you see? we see breakthrough medicines getting to patients in record time. we see harnessing natural gas unleashing the promise of clean energy. we see engineers simulating the future to improve today. at emerson, when issues become inspiration, focusing core strengths to create a better world isn't just a result, it's a responsibility. emerson. consider it solved. what do you look for i want free access to research.
11:22 am
yep, td ameritrade's got that. free access to every platform. yeah, that too. i don't want any trade minimums. yeah, i totally agree, they don't have any of those. i want to know what i'm paying upfront. yes, absolutely. do you just say yes to everything? hm. well i say no to kale. mm. yeah, they say if you blanch it it's better, but that seems like a lot of work. no hidden fees. no platform fees. no trade minimums. and yes, it's all at one low price. td ameritrade. ♪ ♪ ♪ let's go from plans... to full-blown production. ♪ ♪ let's go from being on-call... ♪ ♪ to being on-line. american express can help move your business forward with loans, vendor payments and buying power. chat with one of our 4000 specialists and let's make it happen. the powerful backing of american express. don't do business without it.
11:23 am
welcome back shares of autodesk turning negative after surpassing estimates for the recent quarter. the company which designs a host of cloud software and products for construction, engineering, manufacturing and digital media, issuing weaker than expected eps outlook. joining us, autodesk ceo andrew anagnost good morning >> good morning, jon. >> this quarter of yours led a
11:24 am
lot of analysts to raise price targets. one knit that perhaps investors are paying attention to, the eps guide. talk about how the investment in new business and growing that led to that. >> yeah. that's what people are trying to process. they saw us exit the year with incredibly strong momentum, record revenue year, 2.6 billion in revenue, that was impressive. 34% growth annualized recurring revenue in q4. what they're trying to understand is how can we hit free cash flow targets which we are afirming, which we reaffirmed when we shrank the eps guide. we acquired great companies, integrating them rapidly, entering the year with momentum in the core and in new trucks areas we're executing on >> i think of you as a bellwether i looked at the geographies, americas grew 23%, amea, 32%,
11:25 am
apj group, 36. i thought some of the other areas were supposed to be slowing? >> yeah. well, see that's one of the great things we're seeing, we're seeing strength across all the markets. everybody is talking about a downturn is coming frankly, we're not seeing it yet. if you look at it from a nongeographic perspective, saw 29% growth in manufacturing business, 35% growth in the aec business, even m and e grew 30% year over year we're seeing strong growth, even in places you would expect slow downs. people have to build a lot of things. >> are your customers perhaps different in some way, they wouldn't be the ones slowing >> well, usually we do get to see early signs in the low end of our business around auto cad and lt in particular that give an indication of decreasing activity but that business grew 36% year over year as well. right now one of thethings we
11:26 am
see bolstering us is everybody is digitizing. they're moving their businesses, their design practice to 2 d and 3-d and investing in construction automation. we don't believe any of that will slowdown, even if we head to downturn. customers need to move to more automated processes to be competitive. >> andrew, it is contessa. as you moved from licensed software to software as a service, your subscriptions blew expectations out of the water here, way ahead of the street, way ahead of your own guidance how do you continue to drive that subscription growth moving forward? >> well, there's a lot of things we basically feel like we're done with the subscription transition we started on the core business that you see us driving, core design business has tons of growth left in it. we have 18 million users worldwide but only 4 million of them are actually subscribers
11:27 am
now. an incremental penetration of 18 million users drives growth in the core business. a lot of the acceleration in subscriber growth you saw with our numbers is from the construction business. that's going to continue to surge forward. we've got a lot of things that are fundamental tail winds to help us drive subscriber numbers up year over year. >> i get nervous when i hear ceos say even if the economy turns down, we're different. i heard a lot of that at barcelona world congress, hearing it around 5g and all sorts of businesses powered by the flow of data i mean, really >> jon, i have some facts on my side here's the thing during the last downturn which hilt the aec business incredibly hard as you know, construction got slammed in the last downturn it grew. and people needed to digitize to
11:28 am
stay competitive they were bidding on fewer and fewer projects, had to win and hit margin goals or they were going out of business. the idea that our customers will continue to invest in new digital technology even through a downturn isn't just a supposition, we saw it happen last time, especially now that we're participating actively in the construction side of the business >> all right well thank you, andrew anagnost, ceo of autodesk. a few percentage points off all-time high. european markets are closing as we speak. dom chu joins us with today's action. >> there was a lot of green. major averages finishing the week on a high note, boosted by upbeat manufacturing data from china and renewed hopes of break through on trade later this month. german stocks were the best performers on the back of stronger than expected retail sales in the last month. the german dax pushing the index
11:29 am
to the third straight weekly gain two strong earnings reports adding fuel to the rally in european equities. first, monclaire, surging after growth in 2018, bucking concerns of slow downs in china, one of the key growth markets a lot of upscale manufacturers they raised dividend by 30%, shares on pace for the best day since march of 2015. finally, the stock of the day, wpp, shares of advertising giant rallying after the company posted better than expected results and issued a strong forecast for the second half of 2019 wpp just launched a three year turnaround plan as it grapples with industry wide shift away from print and digital ads, and tv ads rather to digital something to watch contessa, back to you. >> thank you for that. let's get to sue herera for a news update. hi, sue. >> hello, contessa hello, everyone. here is what's happening israel's labor party organizing
11:30 am
a convoy of cars with black flags to pass by israeli benjamin netanyahu's residence to demand his resignation, after the attorney general recommended criminal charges against him for corruption they called it a black day for the citizens of israel. democratic washington governor jay inslee announcing he is running for president. he appears to be centering his campaign around climate change. southwest suing its mechanics union over what it claims is illegal work slow down that's grounding planes and disrupting flights it charges that some workers are pulling planes out of service for minor mechanical items to gain leverage in contract talks. and a new dr. seuss book soon to be published the manuscript was discovered in his home 21 years after his death. it is about a horse that gives kids a tour of an art museum that's set to be released on september 3rd.
11:31 am
soon to be on school reading lists everywhere that's the news. back to you guys on "squawk alley. contessa >> a course, of course >> of course >> sue, thank you. i read a lot of dr. seuss these days. when we return, amazon hq, community backlash in northern virginia is growing following the outcome in new york city are amazon's expansion plans across the country in jeopardy "squawk alley" continues after a quick break. the krns trecnbc trend trac brought to you by cme group. greetings and welcome... now tell me are you one of those folks who needs to connect to the traditional stock exchanges? then i'm about to show you something you cannot succeed without. literally! this cable. looks ordinary, right? (and it is!) but plug it into your trading systems, and... whoah... you open a whole new world of shockingly basic access
11:32 am
to those fusty old exchanges and the data they distribute. we're talking monopolistic-levels of access. like, what-am-i-paying-for-exactly levels of access. want the ability to simply trade on modern markets? it's in the cable. want access to the information you need to function at your job? it's in the cable. want to be forced to join in a pay-to-play system that's anti-competitive and learn to like it? come on folk, kiss that cable! it's the only cable you're ever going to need. this cable absorbs all your extra capital! now other places may try to sell you this cable for a hundred bucks. because, let's be honest, it's just a cable. but if you call in the next ten minutes, it can be yours, not for 100... not for 75... we're talking recurring monthly payments of $19,995.95 and that's before you make a single trade! if that sounds artificially high for what's really just an off-the-shelf wire that is basically just the cost of entry... well...too bad! act now - because you have to! seriously. you have to.
11:34 am
news to get to on caesars, announcing an agreement with icahn, appointing three to the board. if a new ceo is not approved by new directors in 45 days, caesars shares up two and a third percent on that news i'm just back from las vegas the sense there from the conversations that i've had is that carl icahn with nearly 10% stake in caesars is driving this ship at this point, that there's been interest about coming in, a lot of talk of sale. there's no serious offers on the
11:35 am
table or anything like that. this issue of resolving who is going to lead the company, who is the new ceo is the issue of urgency at the moment. another urgent issue, breaking news on lyft. >> they flipped the s 1 to be public they filed confidentially in december we know the contents in a 220 page s 1 they decided on nasdaq they put in a $100 million place holder that will almost certainly change before they go public they were valued about 15 billion privately. it is reported they're aiming for ipo valuation upwards of $20 billion. according to the filing that was just disclosed, they're looking at two classes of stock. the deal will be managed by jpmorgan, credit suisse and jeffries and quick look at the risk
11:36 am
factors, history of losses, not surprising also intense competition they cite as well as laws and regulation that could effect their company and their deal in terms of a road show, a source close to the deal tells me they would be aiming for march 18th to launch that. that process usually takes between a week and a half to two weeks, so we should be looking at a debut for them by march in terms of when people will be able to buy their shares significantly, this is the first of major unicorns that has flipped ipo to be disclosed so people can review it other ipos we expect in 2019 include slack, pinterest, post mates, pell ton, and uber. back to you. >> thank you in this s 1, uber mentioned 15 times lyft lays out main
11:37 am
ridesharing competitors, uber, get, via main competitors in the scooters, uber, lime, bird this will be an interesting look. >> at the actual business. >> and the whole environment that so many of these play in. >> and to get out ahead of uber, in so many ways, they're the pure play. had uber gone first, it would have been more complicated for lyft. >> how >> i don't want to say it is a messy situation, you'll see a ridesharing business, uber eats and other ancillary businesses, investments in artificial intelligence, autonomous vehicles it will look different i think if you were them, getting out there ahead is probably the right decision. >> and makes sense if they stick to pure play mode, don't pull a
11:38 am
go pro, we're -- >> i think this is a focused company. they watched the other guys do it the other way. coming up, general atlantic's bill ford on amazon's decision to leave new york, what he is doing to try to change their mind. and next, another live report from morgan at the kennedy space center ahead of the spacex launch tonight. more "squawk alley" is ahead stay with us so, servicenow put your workflows in the cloud, huh? mmhm. your employees must love you. [ chuckles ]
11:39 am
thank you. you could say that. i love you. servicenow works for you. your daily dashboard from fidelity. a visual snapshot of your investments. key portfolio events. all in one place. because when it's decision time... you need decision tech. only from fidelity. you need decision tech. and everyone i've ever opioloved away from me.thing everything. i blew my ankle out and i got prescribed pain pills by my doctor. if making my detox public is gonna help somebody i'm all for it.
11:40 am
i just wish i would've had a warning. hey, how ya doing? uh, phil. are you guys good with brakes? we're ok. just ok? we got a saying here. if the brakes don't stop it, something will. that's not a real saying. it is around here. i wrote it. just ok is not ok. especially when it comes to your network. at&t is america's best wireless network, according to america's biggest test. now with 5g evolution. the first step to 5g. more for your thing. that's our thing.
11:41 am
spacex set to launch the crew dragon capsule in a few hours. let's head back to florida and morgan brennan why is this a critical test for the company and for elon musk? >> reporter: it is absolutely a critical test, contessa. tesla might be in the headlines, but elon musks other company is poised to make big news. tonight's demo one mission on behalf of nasa would mark a major milestone not just for the commercial space flight industry and america as a whole if all goes according to plan, it will be the first time a commercially built spacecraft designed to hold humans is launched to orbit, scheduled to visit the international space station, doing so on behalf of the government here is why this is so noteworthy since the space shuttle program was retired in 2011, the u.s. lost the capability to send astronauts from u.s. soil into
11:42 am
orbit. we pay russia currently a lot of money to do that for us. to remedy the situation, nasa awarded two contracts under a program called commercial crew, one to spacex to develop the crew dragon and the other to boeing for $4.2 billion. what makes it noteworthy, it is a public, private partnership. boeing and spacex own and operate the vehicles, nasa will essentially be leasing them for missions it is a different model than the government used in the past for space missions and speaks to how crucial the private sector has become to the new space race guys, the reason we're here today, this test tonight is going to be uncrewed, not going to be any people on board, but spacex is the first to get this far in the process it is considered a very critical test boeing is expected to do its version of this test next month.
11:43 am
in terms of the mission itself, behind me you can see on launch pad 39-a it will be a falcon 9 that blasts off with the crew dragon cap sell. 2:41:00 a.m., i will be awake to watch it myself. it will travel to the international space station, expect it to automatically dock, something we haven't seen happen before either with the space station sunday, and stay until it returns to earth friday for an ocean landing and guys, i would also just note that there is a pay load on board this capsule 400 pounds of cargo for astronauts currently on board the space station, and there is a passenger, a mannequin, equipped with sensors to be able to test out the flight experience clad in a spacex astronaut suit,
11:44 am
in now typical spacex fashion, they named that passenger riley in honor of the classic space based horror movie "alien. back to you. ripley excuse me. >> thank you that's a great shot. let's talk about the letter sent to jeff bezos. he is with us after the break, an interview you don't want to miss fireworks will go off. stay tuned ckn mont ba ia me
11:45 am
11:47 am
several high profile new york city business leaders and government officials sent an open letter to jeff bezos urging the ceo to change his mind and bring amazon's planned h q2 and 25,000 jobs that come with it back to long island city joining us, one of the ceos that signed that letter, general atlantic's bill ford good morning >> good morning, jon, how are you? >> i'm doing well. doing well hope you are, too. how did you get involved in this and do you think it will work? >> well, i'm the co-chair of the partnership for new york and we felt very strongly that the business community needed to send a very positive message to amazon that we want them here, they're welcome here, and they'll be a positive for the business community
11:48 am
one thing we did is conduct a survey after the decision came out and found overwhelmingly new yorkers were positive and wanted amazon here, and again, we wanted to send a positive signal to amazon we hope they'll reconsider >> so i still don't get why they backed out i mean, the overall numbers of public opinion were in their favor and anybody that's been in new york knows, i mean, look how new yorkers treat the knicks nobody is universally popular. why do you think they backed out in the first place >> we all know new york is a full contact sport city and i think that may have put amazon off, but i think there are such positives to amazon and new york for having them come here. we've got to get them to reconsider we all know deals have ups and downs. hopefully we can get this deal back on track as soon as possible i think the governor's call this week was very positive. >> hey, bill, but let's talk a moment about mayor de blasio
11:49 am
he ostensibly said come on down, we want you in new york, and then seemed to happily say don't let the door hit you on the way out. is he somebody that you would trust negotiating with >> i think i'm not the right person to comment on politics as you know, but i think both the mayor and the governor have said, you know, in totality very strong signals that amazon is wanted here, and we need them in new york and in queens and i think that's why the governor reached out this week and said it really is the right thing to reconsider, and i think we at the partnership felt we wanted to send a strong message the business community wants to put out a welcome mat for amazon one thing we talked a lot about is moem in new york around entrepreneurship you look at the cornell campus, the google campus, facebook campus, our own set of unicorns, successful ipos, new york's technology sector has great momentum now and the
11:50 am
entrepreneur sector has great momentum and the amazon campus would only add to that, it would bring tech talent and would be good for queens. >> since amazon made the announcement, there has been one significant change and that is that the leader removed this one state senator who would have had veto power over the deal for amazon that's not going to happen any longer everything else remains the same if they were willing to take their ball and go home because other people weren't playing nice, what would it take to get them back? >> well, i think that's a pretty significant road block that was removed. they've got clear line of sight to getting that headquarters up and running and i think that is a pretty big positive. i think that combined with the governor and the mayor really being even more urgent in terms of pushing this, i think they've got clear sailing. >> does that make new york come off as desperate are we showing all of our cards
11:51 am
by saying, hey, please, please, please come back i compared it to a love story last week gone wrong it seems a little needy. >> no. i think it's just sending a signal that we're open for business new york is about business and about job creation the big worry i have if we aren't able to reverse the decision is what signal does it send for companies who want to start, that want to relocate, for entrepreneurs that want to start businesses we want new york to be a positive force for innovation and technology and the amazon headquarters only adds to that we've got to put everything we can behind getting this decision reversed and the governor's call was a great start. i think we in the business kmunts wa community want to send a message directly to amazon and jeff b bezos that we're open for business. >> the other question is the state senator that will replace
11:52 am
the state senator that did not want this deal to happen, it's not locked in stone right now. do you have any assurance that there will be somebody ready to do this? >> well, i know it's not locked in stone, but i hope the politicians are paying more attention to what the public wants. i mean, we've done surveys right after this decision and it was very, very clear that overwhelmingly new yorkers want the amazon headquarters here and overwhelmingly they want technology and believe in technology, both big tech and small tech and entrepreneurial tech i think that hopefully will lead the amazon board to reconsider their decision. >> bill, we just got an s1 made public from lyft you're an investor in uber a lot of people are anticipating that company, its public offering as well how important is this lyft offering setting the stage for other transportation investment? >> i think very -- at uber we're pleased that lyft is moving
11:53 am
forward. they're going to i think create awareness among the investment community about how important the global ride share market is. we think amazon's the leader but there's no -- we have no problem with lyft setting the stage for what we think is a very, very important global market >> you think amazon is the leader >> i'm sorry >> you said you think amazon is the leader do you mean uber >> i meant uber. i'm sorry. >> go ahead. >> i think uber is -- you know, will be right behind lyft. again, i think the lyft offering will unlock the ipo and the attractiveness of the ride share market. >> we talk about lyft and uber in the same sentence, but i happen to think they may turnout to look like very different companies, lyft being a pure play if you will in this space and uber being, and this might be a benefit, but a more complicated business with uber eats, with various investments
11:54 am
in autonomous vehicles and the light and a more expandsive plan do you think that's going to -- how do you think investors will compare lyft to uber and should they >> i think it's a divergence and moving more to being a super app for transportation when you add in food delivery around uber eats, which is a very important value driver for the company, i think we have a more multi facetted business model and we want to have a different relationship with the customer than to be just about ride share you're right to point that out i think it gives us more market opportunity. we think we're already taking significant share from the other food delivery businesses and that's going to continue >> all right thank you, bill. bill ford of general atlantic talking some amazon and uber "squa "squawkal "squawk
11:57 am
this changes everything. you're right sir... everything. well not everything, i mean you're still blatantly sucking up to me gary. ahhh... stop it. servicenow. works for you. . joining us from sfaan francisco, as you're going through this, anything standing out to you >> yeah. something really stood out to me lyft says its market share, this is a big point of contention between the two companies. lyft his been gaining on uber,
11:58 am
but uber the much larger rival lyft says its ride share market was 39% as of december of 2018 up from 22% in december of 2016. so we know very well what uber has been through over the last few years. a lot of pr disasters. if these numbers are correct, it looks like lyft has done a lot more to eat away at that uber market share do keep in mind, though, these figures, i had to check the footnote they're coming from racutan intelligence the largest outside share holdener lyft. another thing that stood out is duel class structure s1 confirms that this is going to trade different than a public company. uber has a one class share because of the investment from soft bank, but the founders at lyft, they will have voting control of this company and that could mean a lot of things when
11:59 am
the company goes public, like whether it's included in indexes and etfs >> yeah. also note nearly a billion dollar loss from operations in 2018 on just over -- sorry, let's see. yeah, on just over $2 billion in revenue mp revenue. so the losses here are significant. when they say no guarantee we're going to make a profit anytime soon, that's probably why, right? >> yeah. i think that was the first risk factor they identified in depth, but i would also note that that 2018 revenue, $2.2 billion, that's doubling 2017's revenue, so these you widens, but remember, these companies aren't going to be bought because they're expected to be profitable anytime soon. i would say, though, that lyft is heading towards profitability i think earlier than uber. its unit economics seem better
12:00 pm
at this point, but we'll have to continue to dig through them this is really the first glance we're getting at lyft's financials, but uber has made a habit of making its financials public. >> right >> i don't know if anyone is looking at this, but gm stock should move today. >> we will see thank you and that doll it for us here on "squawk alley". have a good weekend. let's send it over to scott walker in the half. >> john, thanks. stocks off to their best start to a year since 1991 what will it take for the rally to spring ahead in the months to come 12:00 none this is "the halftime report". >> stocks are marching higher. the s&p posting its best start to the year in nearly 30 years the key level to watch is coming up plus the apple annual shareholder meeting getting under way in california. and pete is tracking the options market for opportunity the one stock he
77 Views
IN COLLECTIONS
CNBC Television Archive Television Archive News Search ServiceUploaded by TV Archive on