New York, April 27, 2026, 12:02 EDT
- Uber shares climbed Monday after new stock-pick chatter brought Bill Ackman’s sizable position back into the spotlight.
- Now, the main question isn’t Uber’s stance on robotaxis — it’s whether the company can actually retain them on its platform.
- The pressure’s on as Waymo, Tesla, and upstart ride-hailing competitors around the world push up the price tag for keeping pace in autonomous transport.
Uber Technologies climbed roughly 2% Monday, with investors zeroing in on Bill Ackman’s persistent position in the ride-hailing company and Uber’s push to weave autonomous vehicles directly into its app. Shares hovered around $76.17 late in the morning in New York, putting the company’s market cap close to $161.8 billion.
Timing is key here. Uber isn’t just moving as a ride-hailing play anymore—it’s fast becoming a battleground over who owns the customer in autonomous vehicles. In a Monday article, Motley Fool pointed out that Ackman holds significant stakes in Uber and Meta, highlighting Evercore’s Mark Mahaney and his $150 target on Uber. That figure would mean roughly 100% upside from the price mentioned in the piece.
Last week, Yahoo Finance picked up an Insider Monkey piece that put Uber at number two on a list of Ackman-linked long-term stocks. According to fourth-quarter filings, Pershing Square reported holding roughly 30.1 million Uber shares, barely shifting from the previous quarter. A Form 13F details the listed equity positions of major U.S. investment managers every quarter.
The story for Uber has changed gears quickly. Where it once prided itself on steering clear of car ownership, the narrative lately points to a chunkier play: snapping up access to fleets of autonomous vehicles, grabbing equity in partner firms, and pushing to become the go-to demand platform for robotaxi services. Autonomous vehicles—AVs—handle driving without a human at the wheel in certain settings.
Lucid stands out lately. According to a prospectus it filed with the SEC, Uber and certain fleet operators tied to Uber have committed to purchase at least 25,000 Lucid midsize platform vehicles for use as robotaxis. That would push Uber’s total Lucid vehicle obligation to 35,000 units. On top of that, an Uber subsidiary has agreed to snap up $200 million worth of Lucid common stock via private placement.
Uber, Lucid, and Nuro had all shown off their production-ready robotaxi models at CES, with autonomous road testing already underway ahead of a planned Bay Area rollout sometime in 2026. “State-of-the-art robotaxi to market later this year,” promised Sarfraz Maredia, Uber’s global head of autonomous mobility and delivery. Uber Investor Relations
The pressure is unmistakable. Waymo, under Alphabet, keeps ramping up robotaxi trips. Tesla continues to dominate the autonomy debate among investors. In China, Geely-backed Caocao is aiming to roll out thousands of custom-built robotaxis worldwide by 2027. Uber’s strategy? Turn these shifts into new business, not lost rides.
Bulls keep leaning on Uber’s scale. In the fourth quarter, the company posted 202 million monthly active users, $54.14 billion in gross bookings, and $14.37 billion in revenue. CEO Dara Khosrowshahi told investors there’s a “clear path” for Uber to become the biggest AV trip facilitator globally. Uber Investor Relations
That sheer size is the crux in recent stock-pick writeups. Last week, Neil Patel at The Motley Fool pointed to Uber’s hefty user pool as a core advantage on the demand front, suggesting that AV spending isn’t outlandish if robotaxis catch on inside Uber’s network.
The risk, though, looms large. In a January column, The Motley Fool pointed to Melius Research’s Conor Cunningham, who flagged Uber as carrying “the most risk from increased competition” as robotaxis scale up. Should Waymo, Tesla, or another player start capturing more rides within their own apps, Uber’s marketplace muscle could take a hit. The Motley Fool
Execution risk looms in the supply chain. According to Lucid’s filing, the Lucid Midsize Plus vehicles aren’t expected to roll out until late 2028. The company put its first-quarter operating loss somewhere between $985 million and $1.01 billion. Demand on Uber’s side may be there, but the vehicles, the software, regulation, and the economics all need to line up first.
At this stage, Ackman’s unwavering stance is being taken by investors as a sign of confidence—he’s betting Uber can manage the shift in how rides get supplied without losing its edge. Shares are still trading far under their 52-week peak of $101.99. Bulls see that gap as evidence the market hasn’t factored in a smooth autonomous vehicle rollout yet. Bears, on the other hand, point to the same discount as proof that skepticism is warranted.
