In the US and Europe, Uber’s issues are more of the lawyerly type. It fights to maintain surge pricing, its status as a platform and not an employer, and its right to operate in certain cities and airports. In growing markets—places like India, Latin America, the Middle East, and Africa—its challenges are a bit more basic. How can it connect riders, especially those operating old, slow, and data-limited phones, to drivers?

Today, Uber announced the release of a new app, Uber Lite, to help answer that essential question in essential markets. Uber Lite is like Uber, but smaller and less razzle-dazzle-y. At 5 MB (about the size of two photos) and with 300-millisecond response times, this is an app built with older, data-limited Androids in mind, and for places where internet connections are spotty-to-nonexistent. For now, Uber Lite will only be available in three Indian markets (Jaipur, Hyderabad, and Delhi), but will expand to other countries before the end of the year.

To put it another way: Uber Lite is an app to help Uber conquer developing markets. And to smash the competition, starting with homegrown Indian ride-hailer Ola. (Ola released its own, 1 MB Lite app in late 2017.) It's an increasingly common move: Facebook, Twitter, Google, and Skype all offer Lite apps.

As the American unicorn preps for IPO sometime in 2019, it’s looking for ways to exit unprofitable markets and double down in those where it could make money. The company might be valued at $62 billion, but it lost $312 million in the first quarter of 2018, before accounting for interest, taxes, and other expenses. It has burned through more than $10 billion since founder Garrett Camp conceived of the business while struggling to find a cab in the very first hours of 2009.

So Uber relinquished China to Chinese ride-hail giant Didi Chuxing. In late 2017, it officially merged its Russian business with local competitor Yandex. In April, Uber exited seven Asian countries, ceding that territory to the Singaporean ride-hail company Grab. (That deal gave Uber a 27.5 percent stake in Grab.) Observers split over Uber’s India strategy, but it’s looking very clear now: The ride-hail company is in India to stay, mindful of its deep unprofitability there, but eying the 150 million new smartphone users set to come online by 2022.