Super Pumped: The Battle for Uber

by Mike Isaac

At the Code Conference’s private dinner, Kalanick and Holzwarth were seated with the heavy hitters; powerful CEOs of the Valley’s biggest companies. He should have enjoyed his meal—this was the ultimate validation of Kalanick’s success and influence. Instead, he spent most of the evening watching Sergey Brin chat up his girlfriend. Holzwarth was polite, good at conversing with even the most awkward engineer. But Brin, who was going through a messy, public divorce after having an affair with one of his employees, ignored Kalanick, oblivious to the optics. Before the meal ended, Kalanick snapped an iPhone photo of Brin’s cozy-looking chat with Holzwarth and texted it to Drummond. He later told Drummond he saw Brin place his hand on Holzwarth’s leg, and that he believed that Brin’s behavior was a liability for Google. Despite Drummond’s talents, there was no smoothing over what happened that night. After the dinner, Brin asked Holzwarth to hang out with him and talk by the pool later that evening. Kalanick stewed. Google was going out of its way to screw him. And now he watched as the man who was going to kill his company tried to steal his girlfriend.