Ex-Uber boss paid $500 an hour reveals how company ‘deceived’ regulators

The rideshare giant’s ex-Queensland general manager is receiving 86 times the minimum Uber driver’s fare to appear as a witness in a court case that’s uncovered some ugly truths.

Mike Abbott pictured in 2015 at Uber’s office on Constance St in Fortitude Valley. Picture: Mark Cranitch

The venture capital partner Uber is paying $500 an hour to appear in court has testified the rideshare company used software to deceive regulators and prevent them from making bookings.

Mike Abbott, the US rideshare giant’s former Queensland general manager, is receiving remuneration as much as 86 times the minimum Uber driver’s fare – of $5.80 – to appear as a witness in the case. Theoretically, that $5.80 could reflect a 1-minute fare.

Since his first appearance on Monday afternoon, he would be owed more than $3000. Mr Abbott is not being paid for his affidavits, only his time in the courtroom.

An Uber spokeswoman told The Australian that compensation was not unusual for witnesses. “It is not uncommon to reimburse witnesses who are not a party to litigation for reasonable personal costs incurred while appearing in court, including travel and what they otherwise would have been paid for their time,” she said.

Mr Abbott has spent the past two afternoons under cross-examination, where he has revealed that Uber had actively attempted to prevent regulators from taking trips and fining drivers. When asked to explain a technique used by the company known as “greyball”, he confirmed the purpose was “we made it difficult for the regulator to book Uber trips”.

“I don’t recall exactly but it involved a geofence around where we thought the regulator’s office was … that would either block their phone or show them a version of the app but they could not see any cars,” Mr Abbott said.

It is now week three in the Taxi Apps (GoCatch) versus Uber trial, with the former seeking hundreds of millions of dollars of compensation from the latter, claiming Uber did everything in its power to kill its business between 2012 and 2014.

The court case, which has some of Australia’s top legal talent on either side, has uncovered some uncomfortable truths about both companies and equally unflattering commentary from some of the nation’s top investors.

Mr Abbott is the third venture capitalist brought into the trial, with AirTree and Square Peg having already made an appearance in the first week.

His role has not been as an investor but rather one of the people central to GoCatch’s claims of hacking and intentionally setting out to harm the company.

Mr Abbott spent six years – between October 2012 and July 2018 – with Uber as it illegally launched across the country. He was instrumental in the company’s Brisbane launch in the role of Queensland general manager at the time, the court has heard.

He has continued to deny that he was aware what Uber was doing was illegal, telling the court he believed there was some “ambiguity in the law”.

When asked by Michael Hodge, KC, whether he took steps to understand regulation, he was not able to offer a response that satisfied Mr Hodge.

In a slide show read before the court, which Mr Abbott had created and presented to Uber’s US executives in May 2014, he had referred to himself as “I am the guy to crush Brisbane”.

On that same slide, it showed Mr Abbott pitching his achievements over the past 18 months.

“I am passionate about Uber, the difference we are making and I REALLY want to make Brisbane work,” he wrote.

He’d also bragged of being behind the process to “warn/suspend/deactivate” taxis who were a part of the company’s Uber Taxi service. In another slide detailing the company’s first three weeks in Brisbane, he wrote, “we have been laying low as the regulatory environment is hairy”.

It had done that with “limited press and no direct contact from the regulator”.