The Cap Table of Evil

The news yesterday that Uber had accepted a frankly ludicrous $3.5bn investment from the Saudi government raised two questions.

One: What are the Saudi government’s portfolio company parties like? “Hi, I’m the partner who funded Uber / “And I’m the guy who funded 9/11 and the Taliban. Oh, and have you met Steve -- he led our investment in Twitter.”

Two: How does the evilness of Uber's new Saudi backers compare with, say, the evilness of the company’s previous Russian oligarch investors?

I can’t help you on the first question. I’m relieved to say there’s zero chance we’ll be invited to attend that particular circle of hell, although I hear the canapes are just to be beheaded for.

On the second, I’ve got you covered. Here for future reference is the ascending 0-10 scale of investor evilness.

0: Teddy Ruxpin

1: Hunter Walk

2: Dave McClure

3: Bill Gurley

4: Chris Sacca

5: Pando investor Peter Thiel

6: Any Chinese government department

7: Any Russian oligarch

8: Any Saudi government official

9: Trump spokesperson John Barron

10: Kim Jong-un

In other words, when it comes to investor evilness, Uber is still hovering around an 8 (albeit with an aggregate score of 25).

That said, it's remarkable how unsurprised we’d all be if next week Travis Kalanick was photographed driving around Pyongyang in a self-driving tank.