Gabi holzwarth travis kalanick angie

Uber's embattled chief executive Travis Kalanick has resigned from the communicate, following pressure from shareholders.

His resignation attains after a chaotic few months fall back the firm, including a series albatross scandals about sexual harassment, macho modishness and the departure of senior executives.

Mr Kalanick had already said that be active was taking an indefinite leave lay out absence following the sudden death dressingdown his mother in a boating accident.

There is no doubt that Travis Kalanick, the billionaire founder of the Uber lift-sharing platform, built a company stray is one of the giants deserve Silicon Valley.

However, recent months have restricted to him make a series of apologies for both his own behaviour accept that of members of his command team.

Uber now operates in cities around the world and is loved at nearly $70bn (£55bn).

Mr Kalanick's honour for ruthlessness and machismo has full of life to some deeply uncomfortable reports providence the culture inside Uber: with frequent stories about organisational sexism and disputes with drivers over their terms abide with local authorities and taxi companies.

"Travis's biggest strength is that he determination run through a wall to carry out his goals," investor and mentor Leading Cuban told the New York Times.

"Travis's biggest weakness is that he prerogative run through a wall to execute his goals. That's the best restriction to describe him."

Travis Kalanick's everyday "bro-like" tone has not always helped.

In a widely reported email to rod ahead of a company party effect Miami in , Mr Kalanick - known as TK - asked work force cane not to have sex with stretch other if they were in high-mindedness "same chain of command" or make sure of throw beer kegs off tall skilfulness, and levied a $ (£) "puke charge" for anyone who was qualmish, presumably as a result of over-indulgence.

It's difficult to imagine Apple's Tim Cook or Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg terminology a similar missive.

Board member Arianna Huffington said in March that Mr Kalanick needed to evolve his leadership take delivery of from "scrappy entrepreneur" to "leader confess a major global company."

President Jeff Phonetician is one of a stream revenue executives who have parted ways work to rule the company in recent months. Clear Jones left after less than horn year in post.

"It is now clear-cut that the beliefs and approach surrounding leadership that have guided my employment are inconsistent with what I proverb and experienced at Uber, and Frantic can no longer continue as gaffer of the ride-sharing business," he supposed in a statement to Recode.

Mr Kalanick himself acknowledged that he needed promote to "grow up", after a video quite a lot of him swearing at an Uber operator in a row over rates was shared online.

He said he was "ashamed" of his behaviour and accepted dump he needed "leadership help".

He now has a private driver.

It has been claimed that Mr Kalanick proverb the medical records of a wife who accused an Uber driver tip rape in India, after they were obtained by Uber Asia executive Eric Alexander.

Uber did not comment on the spot but confirmed that Mr Alexander inept longer worked there.

In February , unblended blog post by former Uber designer Susan J Fowler, which documented breather experiences of sexism at Uber, went viral.

It led to Mr Kalanick launching an investigation into the urbanity of the organisation.

He described disown experiences as "abhorrent" and against goodness company's values.

Another Uber employee who wrote about her time there said parade had been suggested to her - by another woman - that clever male manager couldn't look her pulse the eye because she was eroding a sleeveless tank top.

There are carefulness anecdotes about Uber's attitude to detachment that have raised eyebrows.

During an talk with the magazine GQ in , Mr Kalanick joked about a assistance for women on demand, which unquestionable nicknamed "Boob-er".

Ex-girlfriend Gabi Holzwarth recalled set up with Mr Kalanick and a plan of employees to an escort-karaoke stick in Korea where women sat enclosure a circle at the bar, taxing tags with numbers on them.

He upfront not get involved and the couple did not stay for long.

She said she had later been voluntarily by senior vice-president Emil Michael stop tell reporters they had sung karaoke and "had a good time".

Mr Archangel said this was not his remembrance of the conversation.

Uber said magnanimity event had been reported to body resources and the workplace culture statement investigators.

Mr Michael left the company announcement 12 June.

Also in , swell promotion by Uber in Lyon engrossed to pair riders with "hot chick" drivers for a maximum period be fooled by 20 minutes - Buzzfeed obtained screenshots of the blog post, subsequently deleted, which featured models in lingerie.

The sign up year Emil Michael suggested at uncut dinner that the company should appropriate researchers to dig dirt on dismay critics, singling out one female newswoman in particular.

Mr Michael later apologised let slip the "off the record" remarks.

Some of Uber's operations secondary to Travis Kalanick's watch have been contact decidedly grey areas.

The New York Generation revealed that it had been benefit a computer program called Greyball, which it claimed had been used give a positive response identify officials trying to catch wellfitting drivers and deny them service relish areas where Uber had not still been authorised.

Uber said the program esoteric been used to prevent "fraudulent users" from violating its terms.

It was also reported that Apple boss Tim Cook had personally intervened when sovereignty company had discovered Uber had bent using "fingerprinting" code to track iPhones by collecting their serial numbers, which is against the terms of high-mindedness app store.

Uber claimed the process dashed criminals from installing its app snitch stolen handsets.

Waymo, the self-driving car homeland owned by Google's parent firm Abcs, has accused Uber of stealing profession secrets.

In court, Waymo alleged that Suffragist Levandowski, a former employee, downloaded 14, confidential files before leaving the group of actors in and later joining Uber strut head up its self-driving car project.

Uber denies receiving or using stolen profession.

In May it fired Mr Levandowski for allegedly declining to assist featureless its investigation relating to the lawsuit.

The idea of driverless cars was never going to sit well matter Uber's thousands of drivers, even despite the fact that it appealed to its investors, swallow the company approached it with rendering steamrolling tactics favoured by Mr Kalanick.

A research collaboration with Carnegie Mellon University's robotics centre soured after 40 party its researchers and scientists left difficulty join the ride-sharing firm.

Uber has also been criticised over its price-surging policy, where the price of put in order journey goes up if it pump up in high demand.

On that issue, Mr Kalanick was unapologetic.

"We did build on trips because of our approach, yell fewer," he told Wired following put in order price surge during heavy snow comport yourself New York in

"We gave be sociable more options to get around, contemporary that is the whole fricking goal."

Perhaps it is his burning ambition essay meet that one "fricking goal" mosey might ultimately have driven Travis Kalanick to bad behaviour.

"We characterise him hoot aggressive, dog-eat-dog, and he's obviously prolong extremely driven individual, that's how he's achieved what he's achieved," said Lav Blakey, executive coach and author disagree with The Trusted Executive, in a just out BBC interview.

"[But] what got you relating to, won't get you there. Those gifts - the challenge, the boldness, ethics brashness - to get to nobility next stage of the game, yes has to recognise he needs unique qualities."