While the present doesn't always predict the future, the $70 billion valuation placed on ride-hailing service Uber indicates that investors think it poised to transform how we get around by car, how we access meals and groceries more broadly, and perhaps how we eventually travel long distances in the sky. Stating the obvious, Uber's handsome valuation is no more rooted in rides around town than was Amazon's early price solely a reflection of the online book sales that initially launched the Seattle giant.
Needless to say, Amazon's surge from bookseller to one of the world's most valuable companies has redounded to the city of Seattle in impressive ways. Once a dying monument to manufacturing's glamorous past, Seattle has been revived into the picture definition of wealth and opportunity by Microsoft and Amazon, two of the five most valuable companies in the world.
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