E-scooter rental system

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Rental e-scooters

An e-scooter rental system is a form of rental in which the e-scooters (electrically assisted scooters) are usually available in public spaces or at publicly accessible stations. The rental process is similar to that of bike rental systems .

The use of these e-scooters proves to be useful, especially on short distances in urban areas. Lending and returning are contractually (as of autumn 2019) only possible in city centers. The loan takes place after prior registration and registration with the respective provider and there is a loan fee, which typically consists of a fixed amount per loan process and a variable portion over the loan period. Public e-scooter rental systems have existed worldwide since 2017. E-scooters have also been approved in Germany since May 2019, which resulted in the establishment of a number of e-scooter rental systems.

background

Most e-scooters are not privately owned, but are rented out by rental companies for individual trips. Registered interested parties can use an app to locate the vehicles and borrow them using an unlock code. Payment is made with a credit card for every minute used and / or per trip distance, some providers charge a basic fee for every rental. The e-scooters operated by an electric motor are permitted at a maximum speed of between 18 and 25 km / h , depending on local legislation and road traffic regulations . All scooters must be equipped with at least two brakes, lights and proof of insurance. A permanently installed GPS tracker enables vehicles parked at any location to be found both for charging and for maintenance by representatives of the rental company and those interested in using it. The user installs the app of the respective provider and registers with a valid credit card or PayPal account and their mobile phone number. The user then selects a scooter displayed in the app, and the remaining battery charge of the scooter is also displayed. You scan the QR code on the scooter and start your journey. At the end of the journey, the user parks the scooter in one of the parking zones shown in the app and ends the journey via the app.

The market segment for e-scooter rental systems emerged in 2017 and has grown considerably since then. The global market volume is expected to be between USD 40 and 50 billion in 2025. Template: future / in 5 yearsThe US and Europe will be the largest sub-markets with $ 12 to 15 billion each, China with $ 6 to 8 billion and the rest of the world with $ 10 to 12 billion are smaller. The expected strong growth of the market and the hope of gaining high market shares at the beginning of the development of the market segment attract venture capital into the newly founded companies. For example, Tier received a total of 32.4 million euros in venture capital through May 2019 from the venture capital funds Northzone, White Star Capital, Point Nine, Speedinvest and Formula 1 world champion Nico Rosberg . who has also been involved in the company since May 2019.

Offers in Germany

overview

In August 2019, around 30,000 e-scooters were available for hire in Germany. The users are 69 percent male and 31 percent female. 69 percent of users also state that they rent the e-scooter for fun. The average travel time is eleven minutes, with an average of 1.9 km covered. The distances between the individual e-scooter rental systems differ only slightly: Tier gives 1.93, Lime 1.88 and Voi 1.82 km. For comparison: on foot, an average of 0.9 km is covered per route, 3.4 km by bike, 4.9 km by tram, 9.5 km by car and 12.9 km by S-Bahn.

In major German cities such as Berlin, Dresden, Hamburg, Cologne, Munich, Nuremberg or Stuttgart, the following companies have already set up hundreds or even thousands of e-scooters since June 2019: Lime , Tier, Bird , Circ, Jump, Voi and Dott.

Bird

Bird scooter on the roadside

Bird is an e-scooter rental company based in Santa Monica , California . It rents electric scooters in several cities in North America and Europe, including Germany. Bird was founded in 2017 by former Uber CEO Travis VanderZanden.

Circ (subsidiary of Bird)

Circ was founded in August 2018 under the name Flash by Lukasz Gadowski and offers e-scooter rentals in seven countries and 26 cities. Shortly before the start of the offer in the first German city, Flash was renamed Circ. Since June 2019, Circ is also represented in Germany in Berlin and Cologne. An offer in around 80 other cities and communities was sought. The company's e-scooters were orange / black. In January 2020, Circ was acquired by U.S. competitor Bird after Circ struggled to secure further funding for growth, according to press reports. In January 2020, Bird announced that it would take over Circ entirely. Initially, the Circ brand will continue to operate in parallel with Bird on the German market.

Lime

Lime e-scooter in San Diego

In June 2019, the provider Lime started with around 1000 e-scooters in Berlin: locations are at Alexanderplatz , at the Brandenburg Gate and at Checkpoint Charlie . The electric motor can accelerate up to 20 km / h, the range is specified, but also depends on the road conditions and inclines. Borrowing costs 6 euros per half hour. The e-scooters are collected by so-called juicers from 9 p.m. , recharged and distributed in the areas around 7 a.m. the juicers are not employees of the company and are paid per charge.

Lime is active in the following cities (as of August 2020): Berlin, Bochum, Bonn, Dortmund, Dresden, Düsseldorf, Essen, Frankfurt a. M., Hamburg, Hanover, Karlsruhe, Cologne, Lübeck, Mainz, Munich, Nuremberg, Stuttgart and Wiesbaden. It costs € 1.00 to unlock it and € 0.20 or € 0.25 per minute.

animal

TIER scooter in Berlin

The provider Tier Mobility GmbH ( spelling TIER ) based in Berlin had 470 employees in January 2020. It is now active in over 57 cities in eleven countries. Tier was founded in 2018 by former rebuy managing director Lawrence Leuschner , Julian Blessin (co-founder of coup) and Matthias Laug (co-founder and technical director of Lieferando ). According to its own information, the company achieved the two milestones of one million journeys (April 2019) and two million journeys (June 2019) faster than the other competitors. One million journeys were made in Germany within a month of the start of the rental.

Users pay an activation fee of EUR 1.00 per trip and a variable fee of EUR 0.15 per minute. In some German cities such as Hamburg, Munich, Düsseldorf, the variable fee is 0.19 euros per minute. The scooters must be parked in designated parking zones within the business area in the respective city . The company agrees with the respective cities in which zones the scooters can be parked. TIER shows its users the nearest parking spaces and also no parking zones in the app.

In mid-February 2020, the company took over the British start-up Pushme Bikes , which specializes in the development and production of replaceable batteries for smaller electric vehicles. The management wants to further improve its hardware competencies. In February 2020, Tier took over the fleet of the insolvent Berlin e-moped company Coup (company) . This means that around 5,000 e-mopeds, including the charging infrastructure, became the property of Tier. The vehicles were repainted and given the TIER logo. Also in February 2020, the Company announced its current round of financing to more than 100 million dollars it had increased; this was the highest financing round to date for a European provider in the field of micromobility. All of the aforementioned acquisitions resulted in Tier having around 40,000 e-scooters worldwide in May 2020.

During Corona - Shutdowns in Germany (mid-March to mid-May 2020), the Berlin-based company has continued to keep their scooters in the public offer. This brought about a drop in bookings of around 80 percent, but on the other hand the small driving aids remained present. In the meantime, the developers have created a solution to the frequently required helmet requirement : since the penultimate week of May 2020, they have been the world's first e-scooter rental company to offer a helmet box connected to the vehicle (fixed to the handlebar) with a foldable helmet . The head protection complies with the European safety standard EN 1078 for bicycle helmets. The box and helmet were patented by Tier. The first 100 vehicles equipped with it will go into operation in Berlin and Paris in May / June. By the summer, 5000 e-scooters are to be equipped with the safety boxes. - In addition, an antibacterial copper tape was developed on the handlebars, which is being tested in Berlin and Bordeaux , which should be able to destroy almost all bacteria and viruses in a few minutes.

In August 2020 TIER was in 41 German cities, including Berlin, Bremen, Cologne, Dortmund, Dresden, Düsseldorf, Essen, Frankfurt a. M., Hamburg, Hanover, Munich, Nuremberg and Stuttgart. In Austria, scooters are available in Innsbruck, Linz, Klagenfurt, Villach, Wels and Vienna, and in Switzerland in Basel, Winterthur, Zug and Zurich.

Voi

The Swedish company Voi ( company for micromobility ) founded in August 2018 is represented by scooters in the German cities of Aachen, Augsburg, Berlin, Bremen, Düsseldorf, Erfurt, Erlangen, Hamburg, Ingolstadt, Karlsruhe, Lübeck, Munich, Nuremberg, Potsdam and Stuttgart and offers around 50 to a few hundred e-scooters per location. The red-brown painted Voi scooters are also available in eight other European countries.

criticism

Environmental and sustainability aspects

The CO 2 emissions of e-scooters are 125 grams per km. This puts it on a level comparable to rental e-bikes (118 grams) and half as high as a car in city traffic. Public buses, on the other hand, cause 51 grams of CO 2 and bicycles 5 grams of CO 2 when there are high passenger volumes . The question of CO 2 emissions therefore also depends on the question of whether and to what extent journeys by car are replaced by e-scooter rental systems. While the providers advertise to replace inner-city car journeys and thus increase the proportion of emission-free mobility, the high proportion of (additional) fun journeys and the short distance per journey speak against this taking place.

Parking situation

Scooters standing around on sidewalks (Stockholm), an obstacle e.g. B. for people with visual impairment

The electric scooter sharing providers do not have their own parking spaces in Germany, but rather coordinate parking zones for the scooters with the cities. However, since users can theoretically park the scooters anywhere, footpaths or driveways are blocked by improperly parked scooters.

costs

E-scooter sharing is relatively expensive compared to bike rental. For the route in Berlin from Hackescher Markt to Checkpoint Charlie (2.8 km), € 2.35 for Circ, Tier and Voi and € 2.80 for Lime. With the rental bike, the cost is around € 1.

lifespan

E-scooter from Circ defective in a park in Frankfurt

The e-scooters are at risk of vandalism , including willful throwing into water. They need to be serviced to remain operational. This is why companies have their own employees or service companies collect their scooters every evening, charge them electrically and maintain the technology. According to the managing director Leuschner von Tier, the average lifespan of the scooters is between six and seven months. Tier Mobility wants to achieve a service life of up to one year with a new model since summer 2019. The company Circ states that they employ between 15 and 50 people for maintenance, depending on the location, and that they have increased the initial service life from 10 months to 14 months.

The company VOI states that all 400 scooters in the fleet in Erfurt are still in good condition and ready for use after six months of use there. The company assumes a minimum lifespan of 24 months. The battery life should be eight years.

An evaluation by the US online magazine Quartz from March 2019 about e-scooters from Bird in Louisville (Kentucky, USA) showed an average lifespan of 28.8 days.

Web link

Commons : E-Scooter  - Collection of Images

Individual evidence

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