🍰 Cake Comes to LA with a16z

Micromobility America is only 37 days away

Micromobility America is coming to the SF Bay Area on Sep 15-16 for two spectacular days of speakers, panels, and ride demos focusing on the future of transportation by small EVs.

This week, we announced our preliminary speaker lineup, featuring a variety of industry luminaries. You definitely don’t want to miss this event.

Hurry and get your tickets this week - 60% discount ends this Friday, August 12th.

What You Need to Know This Week

• Why shared scooters are like internet cafes.

• $8,400,000,000. That’s how much money investors have poured into shared micromobility companies since 2018, according to a new report by McKinsey. Time will tell how these startups will fare in a cooling VC market, but from the looks of it, Europe may be the bellwether to watch. Investment in European micromobility businesses has quadrupled since 2020, compared to the 2018-2019.

• … Yet nearly half of European cities don’t have scooter rental services. A new venture-building accelerator program aims to change that.

• More automakers are seeing the opportunity in micromobility, with Porsche, Rivian, and Hyundai all investing in ebikes.

• Chinese bikeshare survivors Meituan and Didi are raising prices in a bid to turn a profit. Meanwhile, the pandemic has fueled an explosion of interest in sports cycling in China.

• Hey Los Angeles: We have a great event coming up at the Motoring Club on 8/18 during a16z’s LA Tech Week. Come try out Cake’s amazing lineup of electric motorbikes, and afterward, enjoy an evening of beverages and conversations surrounded by classic cars. Come toast the past and future of mobility with us. RSVP here, space is limited.

• What exactly is an ebike? As hardware startups innovate, the need to define new form factors grows.

• River, an electric two-wheeler startup based in Bangalore, secured $13 million in funding to boost R&D, set up a manufacturing facility, and get its 1st product to market.

• The UK government takes a wait-and-see approach to scooter trial zones and pauses new trials until 2024.

• The iconic Meyers Manx dune buggy is officially being rebooted as an EV. At 1,500 lbs, the dune buggy doesn’t meet the weight qualifications for a micromobility vehicle, but it is a welcome reminder that not all electric cars need to be mammoth SUVs and trucks.

• Your next ebike could be plant-based. Hummingbird has desiged a folding ebike made out of flax.

• The number of shared micromobility trips in North America jumped 54% between 2020 and 2021 according to NABSA, yet ridership is still well below pre-pandemic levels.

• The hottest car alternative in downtown Tampa right now isn’t an ebike or scooter, but a golf cart.

• Niu departs from their traditional styling with the futuristic SQi prototype.

• A new report from the Department of Transport in the UK shows that weekday cycling rates jumped by 47% in the 1st half of 2022.

• Electric bikes, the “other EV,” are posting record sales without anywhere near the same levels of support electric cars receive.

• Could an ebike actually be worth $13,500? A range of 160 miles at 28 mph may justify such a price tag.

• Tier launches its 6th generation escooter equipped with enhanced safety features, including a wider base, improved turn signals, and upgraded hydraulic suspension - we just interviewed Tier’s Lawrence Leuschner on the podcast about the challenges of developing safe hardware and scaling operations to 500+ cities.

• Honda is jumpstarting plans to develop electric mopeds for India.

• The Netherlands is experiencing growing pains with electric mobility. 7f Amsterdammers feel uncomfortable with the faster speed of ebikes.

• Motorcycle sales in Africa are expected to reach 10 million units a year by the early 2030s. The African electric mobility company, Roam, is developing an inexpensive electric motorcycle that will capitalize on that growing market.

• Horace Dediu has been filling our twitter feed with insights about the future of electric cars and the evolution of the Personal Vehicle Market in preparation for his presentation at Micromobility America. You can get a sneak peek of Horace’s projections in an upcoming webinar 👇

Micromobility Pro Webinar

Horace Dediu, coiner of the term "micromobility," will lead the next Micromobility Pro webinar for a data-rich presentation about why everything we think we know about the TAM for micromobility is wrong.

There’s still time to become a Pro member and access over 40 hours of exclusive webinars with data analysts, investors, and micromobility founders.

Pod People

In this week’s podcast episode, host Oliver Bruce interviews Adam Barmby, founder of EAV, about developing cargo ebikes for last mile delivery and being part of Amazon's micromobility hubs in London.

Jobs to Be Done

Welcome to our jobs board, where every week we post open positions in hopes of connecting our talented readers with professional opportunities in the burgeoning world of new mobility. Find out who’s hiring below and sign up for the newsletter to view fresh listings every week.

Hit reply if you have a job that you’re interested in listing.

Dance: Software Engineering Lead & Electronic Engineer (Berlin)

Invers: Senior Project Manager - Product Development & Product Manager New Mobility (Cologne or Siegen)

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