Uber invests €90M in new hub, operations HQ in Lisbon

Uber is investing 90 million euros in a new ‘hub’ and operations headquarters in Lisbon, inaugurated on Thursday, creating more than 400 direct jobs and aiming to hire 200 more people by the end of the year.

According to Uber, the new Lisbon ‘hub’ “will be its main source of knowledge about users, drivers and delivery partners and Uber’s product and technology development in the Southern European region”.

It will offer support for nine European countries, including, in addition to Portugal, France, Spain, Italy, Greece, Israel, Turkey, Germany and Croatia, among others.

“The new ‘hub’ generates innovation, knowledge and complex customer support – as is the case, for example, of the support provided by Uber’s fraud or incident response and security teams – and where the development of processes and products for the region is done, directed at improving the experience of users, drivers, delivery partners, restaurants, retailers and other business partners,” it explains.

The headquarters in Portugal “brings together talent from 28 countries with more than 10 areas of expertise such as Quality, Training & Development, Analytics, Project Management, Operations, Marketing, Communication, among others,” he adds.

Quoted in the statement, Uber’s senior director of Customer Operations EMEA, Régis Haslé, assumes the “commitment to Portugal and the desire to continue to invest in the country”: “We have already made an investment of 60 million euros and we intend to invest another 30 million over the next four years,” he says, considering that “Portugal has professionals of excellence and also the ability to attract the best talent to work at Uber and live in Lisbon.

Since the company arrived in the country seven years ago, “the Portuguese market has been a hub of innovation and growth”, where “products such as Uber Green or the expansion of the service to 100% of the country, among many other innovative projects and initiatives” were created and tested.

“This has been possible thanks to the excellent talent and a positive and productive partnership with Portugal and the Portuguese” adds Anabel Diaz.

In this sense, the technology company assumes “a long-term commitment in the promotion and creation of jobs and innovation in Portugal”.

“Uber’s history with the Portuguese has been a success story. Since very early on, people showed that they wanted a mobility alternative to get where they need within cities and, throughout these seven years, we have been committed to serving our users better and better”, says, in turn, the general director of Uber in Portugal.

According to Manuel Pina, Uber is today “much more than just a travel app”: “We are an app so that everyone can go where they want and receive what they need”, he maintains, assuring that the company will “continue to invest in the country by creating jobs and opportunities” for its partners.