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Lyft drivers are protesting outside the San Francisco hotel where company executives are pitching investors for its $21 billion IPO

Mar 26, 2019, 01:07 IST

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Becky Peterson / Business Insider

  • Lyft's founders are set to pitch West Coast investors this week as part of their IPO roadshow. 
  • Protesters mobbed the Omni Hotel in San Francisco ahead of the scheduled meeting there. 
  • As of 12 p.m. Pacific time, it wasn't clear if the meeting was still occurring as scheduled and some investors said it had been relocated. 

Lyft executives and bankers headed to the West Coast this week to court investors as part of the ride-hailing company's IPO road show.

After a packed meeting last week at New York City's opulent St. Regis Hotel, founders Logan Green and John Zimmer were met with lines of picketers outside San Francisco's Omni Hotel, in the heart of the city's financial district.

Becky Peterson / Business Insider

"Lyft, Lyft you're no good, treat your drivers like you should," protesters chanted on the sidewalks of California Street, directly across from Goldman Sachs' San Francisco office. 

"Tell me what you really want! Justice!" the call-and-response chants droned while hoards of black cars circled and honked outside. 

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See also: Inside the Lyft roadshow in NYC where investors packed the penthouse of a $1,000-a-night hotel

One hotel doorman said that he was getting nervous as light rain started to fall outside. 

By 12 pm, it wasn't clear if the scheduled meeting would still occur. Hotel staff could not confirm when or where the meeting was taking place.

Some investors who arrived at the hotel could be seen leaving soon after. 

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Becky Peterson / Business Insider

The meeting protests coincided with similar actions by drivers in Los Angeles, who are striking Monday in opposition to what they say are consistent pay cuts by Lyft's larger ride-hailing rival.

Lyft has touted its more driver friendly approach for years, but as it seeks to shore up its balance sheet and compete with Uber, that reputation has begun to sour. In New York, easily the nation's largest ride-hailing market, the company filed a lawsuit to overturn new rules that set a minimum wage for all app-based drivers.

The company maintained its beef with regulators was about how the pay was calculated - through a complex "utilization rate" - and not over the principal of paying drivers. Still, the suit angered plenty of drivers and organizing groups.

 

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