Could Trump blunt the e-bike revolution?

Ride-hailers owes drivers unemployment, Grab grabs the cash bag, and LEVs win popularity contest in China.

August 04, 2020

Hello and welcome to the Micromobility Newsletter, a weekly missive about mobility, mostly mobility in cities by small electric vehicles like bikes and scooters. The reason you’re reading this email is that you signed up on our website or came to one of our events.

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Thank you for reading.

Our next guest is…

It’s no secret that there is an aching demand among bike and scooter companies for wireless solutions that are optimized for tracking IoT devices.

Later today on Zoom, Oliver Bruce will talk to Frank Mong, COO of Helium, and Eddie Li, former central ops manager at Lime, about one of the most promising emerging technologies for micromobility: crypto-powered wireless networks.

V2.1

In the two weeks since we launched the second edition of the Landscape Report—our knowingly quixotic attempt to map the entire micromobility sector in one graphic—we’ve been absolutely overrun with feedback. Our inboxes are full of inbounds from entrepreneurs telling us about which companies we missed and how we can categorize the groups better.

This is, of course, exactly what we wanted to have happen. We not only welcome the community’s involvement, we wouldn’t be able to comprehensively portray the industry without it.

To keep up with the volume of new submissions we’ve received, today we are releasing our first patch, Version 2.1, featuring nearly 25% more companies. We hope to roll out more patches, plus wider updates with new categorizations, periodically.

If you enjoy the Landscape Report and have a tip for how we can improve it, our doors are always open.

What you need to know this week

  • After stalling in March and April due to kinks in the supply chain, e-bike sales started soaring in early summer. “In June revenue at Accell, Europe’s biggest bicycle manufacturer, was 53% higher than a year ago, largely thanks to e-bikes. Giant says that its gross margin on e-bikes is around 25%, above its average of 21%.”

  • Could Trump blunt America’s e-bike revolution? An exclusion that spared e-bikes (along with kids’ bikes and helmets) from the US’s 25% tariff on Chinese-made bike products is set to expire very soon. The ramifications for American commuters who are weighing buying their first e-bike due to the pandemic could be huge. China is the world’s largest exporter of e-bikes.

  • Related: e-bikes are taking China by storm, with sharing companies like Didi, Hellobike, Meituan, and Mebike leading the way. “According to data collected by Hellobike, nearly 300 million rides per day were completed on conventional bikes in the country in 2019, but more than twice as many journeys were made on electric bikes and electric scooters during the same year, or about 700 million rides a day.”

  • How city planners could use “simulated data” instead of real trip data to plan bike lanes without risking people’s privacy

  • The UK is forming a new government agency with $2.57 billion budget for the sole purpose of promoting biking and walking. Many Brits already seem sold on this mission. Thanks to COVID-19, bicycles sales in the country increased 63% between April and June, year-over-year.

  • A New York judge ruled that ride-hail companies must start paying drivers unemployment benefits immediately.

  • According to a new study, 17% of people in Europe say they more likely to buy or use an e-bike this year compared to last year; 8% say they already own one.

  • Southeast Asian ride-hailing market leader Grab, whose platform includes many mopeds, raised $200 million from South Korean private equity firm Stic Investments.

  • Jake Coppinger reviewed the best apps for bicycle directions.

  • And The Verge reviewed Eeyo, the incredibly lightweight debut e-bike from Gogoro. Despite some misgivings about its price and practicality, the review is effusive in its praise of Eeyo’s sleek, sporty SmartWheel all-in-one motor.

  • Both Suzuki and Honda sold far fewer bikes and mopeds in India this July than they did last year.

  • For its second pilot, Chicago selected Spin, Bird, and Lime to deploy a total of 10,000 scooters, starting on August 12. Not only that, but e-bikes will be available to Chicagoans through their public bike-share system, Divvy, beginning tomorrow.

  • A new survey about e-scooters found that Black and Hispanic respondents were “significantly more likely than non-Hispanic white respondents to intend to try e-scooters and to be unhappy with current transportation options.”

  • Restaurants across the world are wondering how long their cities will allow them to use street space for outdoor dining. To alleviate uncertainty, New York City is committing to bring back its outdoor dining program next June, following a winter a hiatus. This year, nearly 10,000 New York restaurants applied to convert parking spots into seating areas for customers, saving an estimated 80,000 jobs.

  • The winning design from Spin’s Build a Better Barrier competition: an ultra-cheap bike-lane divider made from recycled car tires.

  • Revel announced it will shut down moped service in New York City pending a safety review after two riders died in separate crashes last month.

  • Link is the latest scooter-sharing service to gain approval to participate in UK city trials.

  • LADOT’s chief warns that Los Angeles’s notoriously bad traffic could get even worse as travel restrictions ease.

  • French fleet manufacturer eBikeLabs is seeking crowdfunding for an international expansion.

  • Boston has issued an RFI from potential vendors and delivery companies “to understand how e-cargo bikes could fit into Boston’s delivery landscape.”

  • Germany’s BlackTea launched a 50-mph electric moped that competes with similar gas-powered models on price.

Jobs to be done

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