The general director of Uber Portugal has made a positive assessment of the TVDE platform's 10 years of activity in the country, but recognised the discontent of some drivers who have been demonstrating for better working conditions.

Francisco Vilaça was speaking to journalists during the presentation of Uber's 10th anniversary in Portugal, a ceremony in which it was revealed that the platform, the first to operate in the country, carried out 200 million trips in 195 Portuguese cities, made by 12 million passengers from 150 nationalities.

“Looking at the 10 years of Uber Portugal we see that official data from the National Statistics Institute demonstrate that the occasional travel sector in passenger vehicles has grown significantly. It was a growth in turnover, in tax collection, in the number of companies, in net employment created”, he explained.

Since 2014 “the sector has grown”, also thanks to Uber's contribution “to making these mobility solutions available to users who needed them, who were looking for them and who thereby created an entire sector to provide the service.”

According to Francisco Vilaça, the entry of the company and TVDE (Individual Passenger Transport in Uncharacterized Vehicle) in Portugal “tripled the turnover of occasional passenger transport in light vehicles, an increase of 480 million euros”.

Furthermore, according to the person responsible, during this decade of operation Uber created “13 thousand net jobs, currently 28 thousand”.

Drivers

Asked about the stoppages of TVDE drivers in recent times for better working conditions, Francisco Vilaça reiterated that the company “respects all the right to demonstrate”, adding that it heard “all requests and all needs that industry players have”.

“It is important to emphasise that we always work to direct and respond to these needs. The need for increased income comes, not just from a certain rate, because we are talking about an industry in which we have found demand - which is the great service that the platform provides -, and the generation of demand for mobility and service needs provided”, he pointed out.

To celebrate a decade, the platform announced the launch of a new travel option, UberX Share, which allows users to save up to 30% in costs if they share the trip with other users who choose the same option.