Bloomberg Businessweek May 30th 2022 pp62-63 “Are We Still Doing Scooters?” “Lime says people are scooting more than ever, but providing urban transit is a hard way to make unicorn-level profits” By Ira Boudway
Read Bloomberg Businessweek for all the details
Summary by 2244
Around Austin-Lime Scooters in action on Rio Grande between West 5th and West 6th, Austin, Texas in April 2022
Data presented
Global monthly active users of selected e-scooter apps, April 2022
A total of 12 million, ~5 million Lime, ~3 million Tier, ~3 million Bird and ~1 million Voi
A focus on Lime
Headcount of 750 and 200,000 Scooters operating in 237 cities-160 in Europe, 60 in North America and 17 ROW
Scooters are more durable, “to endure the rigors of shared use, with current models using replaceable batteries to last five years in the field
Narrative
According to Lime, “Monthly average users haven’t returned to pre-pandemic levels, but they’re creeping up steadily…[with]...those users…taking more and longer trips, trends that help it get more revenue out of every scooter.”
Like many industries, COVID presented a challenge but Lime founded in 2017 was rescued by an infusion of $170M led by UBER in which UBER dumped a “money-losing side business.” Later Lime scored $523M “in convertible debt and term loans.”
Lime reportedly is “roughly back to where it was in 2019…[and it]...crossed 300 million cumulative trips worldwide.” Lime CEO Wayne Ting, notes that Lime was “profitable for every month from June-October…[and]...revenue so far this year is up 70%.” Lime’s exit strategy is cloudy as Bird, which became listed on NYSE in November 2021 by SPAC, has seen its share price drop by 90%.
While climate scientists and others see a role for eScooters etc. in the last-mile of urban transit, according to Colin Murphy (Shared-Use Mobility Center) that “if there is real public value to them, they usually end up being at least subsidized, in not fully run by the public sector.”
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