World scooter capital picks winners and losers

Plus, Boris Johnson prescribes cycling as COVID cure, SoundCloud alums start Netflix for e-bikes, and carmageddon is upon us.

July 28, 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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ICYMI, Founder Shield has put together the key takeaways from its recent Ride-share & P2P leasing panel and made the recording available on demand. 

Get an inside look at the industry from the leaders in the most impactful companies in the space. They discussed their growth, risk, and the future of shared mobility.

What you need to know this week

  • Here comes carmageddon: US roadways are nearly back to pre-pandemic VMT levels. Could the “15-minute city” be the solution to rising congestion? “A new C40 Cities report touts Paris’s model for putting essentials within close walking or biking distance as an economic boost for coronavirus-ravaged municipal budgets.”

  • SoundCloud’s co-founders are launching an e-bike subscription company in Berlin called Dance. While little is known about the bike itself or when it will be available to lease, Dance says its service will include delivery within 24 hours and theft protection for an introductory price of €59 a month.

  • Coincidentally, the tech-rental startup Grover, which is also based in Berlin, just launched a monthly scooter subscription service.

  • Out of 16 companies that applied, Lime, Tier, and Dott have won permits to operate scooters in Paris, arguably the biggest micromobility market in the world. Each provider will be allowed to deploy up to 5,000 scooters for a period of two years, starting in September. The outcome is a major setback for Bird, which bet big on Paris last year by announcing plans to open its biggest European office there and hire 1,000 employees by mid-2021.

  • E-bike maker Cowboy has raised $26 million in Series B funding from Exor Seeds, HCVC, Isomer Capital, Future Positive Capital, and Index Ventures. 

  • Micromobility manufacturer Okai has launched a B2C channel.

  • Deciding in favor of micromobility provider Bond, a Zurich court ruled that Swiss cities cannot impose fees on dockless e-bike schemes.

  • Rivian says it will begin deliveries of its electric truck and SUV next summer. Also, the EV maker is being sued by Tesla for allegedly stealing its secrets.

  • As Razor turns 20, the iconic American kick scooter company has unveiled three new electric models for adults, including a wide-platformed, big-wheeled vehicle called the EcoSmart SUP.

  • UK- and Israel-based startup Gett has raised $100 million for its B2B ride-hail business.

  • Moscow is the latest city to report that car use is now higher than it was before the pandemic started. Its public transit ridership is at 73% of pre-COVID levels.

  • UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson is asking doctors to prescribe biking, among other forms of exercise, to Britons as a way to increase their physical activity levels and lower their risk of contracting coronavirus.

  • Kawasaki is patenting production techniques that would lower the cost of electric motorcycles.

  • In some major US cities, including San Francisco and New York, docked bike-share rentals are almost back to 2019 levels.

  • California air-pollution regulators have proposed requiring that 60 percent of miles traveled by ride-hail passengers be in electric vehicles by 2030.

  • Swoop, a SaaS logistics provider for chauffeured group transportation, has raised $3.2 million in a seed funding round led by Signia Venture Partners.

  • Austin’s bike-share and transit networks are now integrated into a single app, featuring route planning and ticketing.

  • An MIT task force reports it will take at least another decade to develop a truly autonomous vehicle.

  • About 25 Kiwibot delivery robots are now moving food and goods around San Jose for $3.99 an order in partnership with Shopify and Ordermark businesses.

Pod people

Almost no other form of transportation (and certainly no other form of micromobility) has recovered to pre-COVID ridership levels faster than good, old-fashioned docked bike-share.

On the latest episode of the podcast, Oliver Bruce speaks with Laura Fox, general manager of North America’s biggest bike-share system, New York’s Citibike, about how public-private partnerships might point the way forward for the sharing model.

Jobs to be done

Welcome to our jobs board, where every week we post new career openings 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.

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