🚲 LimeBike rides again

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

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Cities across the world are turning to micromobility to get their residents moving again—and sustainability is one of the key determining factors they are using to decide which shared scooter and bike companies to do business with.

With cities’ growing focus on environmental impact, we will discuss how micromobility providers can create programs to support sustainability efforts in order to win more permits.

Join Oliver Bruce, co-host of the Micromobility Podcast, on March 10 at 12PM Pacific for an insightful conversation with experts:

• Laura Evans, Business Development Manager, Battery Solutions

• Melinda Hanson, Co-founder & Principal, Electric Avenue

What you need to know this week

• Lime is going back to its roots as LimeBike. The company plans to spend $50m on a major ebike expansion, doubling the number of cities where it operates in North America and Europe and roughly quadrupling the size of its rental fleet within a year. A large part of the investment will go toward developing a new ebike that will launch this summer with a more powerful 350-watt motor and a swappable battery that is compatible with its scooters. Alongside adding an e-moped to its platform in January and a bike/scooter hybrid in November, Lime’s ebike buildup is part of its business strategy to become the one-stop shop for all trips under 5 miles.

• But perhaps the bigger Lime news this week was reports surfacing that the micromobility firm is in talks with investment bank Evercore as it explores going public via blank-check company. One source with knowledge of the talks said Lime would attempt to bring in 2-3x the $170m it landed in its funding deal with Uber last May.

• eSkootr has revealed the world’s first electric scooter designed for professional racing. Capable of going as fast as car on a highway (62 mph) and composed of state-of-the-art carbon-fiber, the S1X is a far cry from the commuter e-scooters you’re used to seeing on the sidewalk.

• London, one of the last major cities in Europe without shared scooters, is reportedly on the verge of giving licenses to three operators, Tier, Lime, and Dott, the same trio that were selected by Paris last year.

• Kia’s bid to produce Apple’s iCar may have stalled out after the automaker spoke publicly about the deal, but according to recent reports, the two companies are still in talks to manufacture an alternative mode of transportation, one intended specifically for the last mile…

• If the U.S. can subsidize luxury EVs like Jaguars with a $7500 tax rebate, why can’t it do the same with ebikes?

• According to Goldman Sachs, between 2009 and 2020 ride-hail took the largest percentage of VC funding in the mobility sector (37%), followed by food delivery (23%), electric vehicles (19%), AV (10%), and micromobility (7%).

• Uber rival Ola is building a massive e-moped factory on 500 acres in southern India. When complete, the plant will be able to pump out 2m units per year, or roughly 10% of the annual demand in India.

• Brazilian docked bike-share startup Tembici says it is EBITDA positive and expects its 2021 revenue to grow 60% from last year’s $17.5m.

• How micromobility can create value for real estate developers. “A micromobility system overlaid on an area with no traditional transit can provide a similar real estate bump to a traditional transit-oriented development.”

• U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg takes bike-share home from work.

• Lime has seven new vehicles that let people with disabilities access micromobility.

• Can AI help prevent scooter crashes? Since November, Voi has been piloting a system provided by Luna that enables scooters to react in a number of ways to their environment by using data from cameras and sensors. For example, the technology could allow a scooter to automatically slow down or let out an audible warning if it detects a pedestrian in its path. Impressively, the system was able to recognize road surfaces and pedestrians with more than 90% accuracy, according to those involved.

• Bosch eBike Systems is launching online courses to train dealers how to service its parts.

• In China, the road to electric is filled not with Teslas, but tiny, off-brand competitors. “The next phase of mobility isn’t being planned from an office tower in Mountain View. It has begun, instead, with two guys in Shandong putting paneling around a golf cart because they think grandpas will like it and they know it will sell. It’s a car pitched to everyday workers, not venture capitalists. For a large chunk of China’s population, and perhaps soon, those in other parts of the world, this is what the road to electric looks like.”

• How micromobility could fit into President Biden’s plan for a nationwide EV charging network. “At the federal level, the Build Back Better Plan proposes creating 500,000 new EV charging stations by 2030—and LEV charging should go right alongside that.”

• Many Bay Area residents can now exchange 15+ year old cars for $7500 toward ebikes, bike-share, and transit.

• Volkswagen announced it will start supporting the leasing and financing of bicycles and ebikes.

• Activists in Berlin are seeking a referendum that would ban automobiles from much of the center city within six years. According to a recent poll, support for car-free cities is now firmly within the mainstream in Germany.

• Relatedly, the German city of Heidelberg is letting cars know they’re not welcome. “If you need a car, use car sharing. If you can’t use car sharing because you’re living too far outside and there is no mass transportation, then use the car, but just to the train station and not to downtown.”

• Australia is moving toward a national micromobility standard.

• Honda’s motorcycle and moped sales were up 29% in February, year-over-year.

• A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit brought by the ACLU against the city of Los Angeles regarding the collection of real-time data on shared electric scooters, including the start- and end-points of users’ trips. “In delivering its ruling, the court said LADOT’s interests were ‘legitimate and substantial’ and dismissed privacy concerns regarding the Mobility Data Specification (MDS), finding it legal and consistent with both the Fourth Amendment and the California Electronic Communications Privacy Act (CalECPA).”

Jobs to be done

Welcome to our jobs board, where every week we post open positions in hopes of connecting our 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.

• Head of Warranty and Service @ Ampler Bikes (remote Europe)

• Product and Marketing Manager @ eBikeLabs (Grenoble)

• Senior Business Development Manager, Senior Growth Manager, and Senior Telematics Product Manager at INVERS (Cologne)

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