Ride AI

In today’s episode, Oliver interviews Mark Frohnmayer, CEO of Arcimoto, a new 1100lb+ electric trike that has just gone into production in Eugene, Oregon. Arcimoto is aiming to a hit a US$12k production price point for a vehicle with 70+ miles of range and able to conform to all roading infrastructure, including highways. We unpack why this is a disruptive solution to the market. Specifically we dig into: - The origin story for Arcimoto and why Mark launched the company - The specifics of the vehicle, including their design tradeoffs and benefits and what ‘rockstar parking’ means - Their planned routes to market, including rentals and enterprise customers - The challenges of getting to production, and where they’ve learnt lessons - How and why they’re interested in adding autonomy to their design platform - Why their manufacturing strategy is disruptive compared to existing vehicle manufacturing techniques today - Their plans for expansion globally - What the capital markets have been like for them as they went from concept to production Thanks to this week’s sponsor Particle. Particle provides an end-to-end IoT platform, from device management to connectivity to hardware for connecting micromobility vehicles to networks and reducing complexity as operations scale. For operators that I’ve talked to, they’re a godsend in the world of highly complex and competitive operations. Visit Particle.io/micromobility to learn more and request a free IoT development kit. All podcast listeners will also receive a free consultation. Visit Particle.io/micromobility today.

In this episode, Oliver interviews David Hyman, CEO of Unagi Scooters about the market for premium, lightweight owned micromobility. David’s background is in software and marketing, having previously been the CEO of Beats by Dre. Unagi has really nailed the owned scooter brand experience, and it’s a great discussion. Specifically we dig into: - Features and tradeoffs that they made in order to deliver the best ownership experience - The origin story for the Unagi Scooter - The overall market potential for the space and how they’re thinking about it - The importance of quality and signalling for something that is personally owned, and how that differs from shared services - What he sees happening for the micromobility space, both owned and shared, in the coming few years - Their recent raise of $3m, who it came from and what they intend to do with it. Thanks to this week’s sponsor Particle. Particle provides an end-to-end IoT platform, from device management to connectivity to hardware for connecting micromobility vehicles to networks and reducing complexity as operations scale. For operators that I’ve talked to, they’re a godsend in the world of highly complex and competitive operations. Visit Particle.io/micromobility to learn more and request a free IoT development kit. All podcast listeners will also receive a free consultation. Visit Particle.io/micromobility today.

In today's packed episode, Oliver interviews Dmitry Shevelenko, CEO of Tortoise, an autonomous scooter software company about the potential of self driving scooters in clearing clutter, improving economics and unlocking the suburbs for shared micromobility. Specifically we dig into: - Dmitry's background at Uber leading business development in micromobility, and how that led him to coming across his co-founder. - The promise and potential of self rebalancing micromobility networks, and how that is appealing to operators and regulators. - Why they're pursuing a horizontal strategy in the space, and why that's required based on the industry structure. - Why the simplicity of the tech stack/operations, low cost and high levels of vehicle replacement make this a well suited space for the rapid iteration of the tech space. - What the discussions with regulators has been like, and the key considerations that they have. - The competitive landscape for autonomous micromobility and where Dmitry sees the threats in the space. - Their go to market strategy using teleops first, moving towards increased levels of autonomy over time. - What are the KPI's that are important for them, especially around operations. - What is the funding environment like now that scooter companies are in the trough of disillusionment, and how investors are thinking about the bet on them. Thanks to this week’s sponsor Particle. Particle provides an end-to-end IoT platform, from device management to connectivity to hardware for connecting micromobility vehicles to networks and reducing complexity as operations scale. For operators that I’ve talked to, they’re a godsend in the world of highly complex and competitive operations. Visit Particle.io/micromobility to learn more and request a free IoT development kit. All podcast listeners will also receive a free consultation. Visit Particle.io/micromobility today.

In this episode, Oliver interviews Frank Reig, CEO of Revel, an e-moped sharing system in NYC/DC that has just announced a $27.6m raise to expand to 10 new cities. It’s a fascinating interview as shared e-mopeds have a number of key operational improvements over the more popular kick scooter/electric bike shared systems that we’ve seen. Specifically we discuss: - Their recent raise and plans for the next 12-18 months. - Their origin story from Frank’s experiences in Argentina and his background in the electric vehicle space - The financial, infrastructural and operational advantages of using e-mopeds over normal kick scooters, and how that drives them to consider themselves more like a parallel to the carshare industry than the kick scooter industry. - Their fleets in NYC and DC, and the experiences they’ve had working with regulators in both. - How they deal with parking, and why they believe that is part of Revel’s ‘special sauce’. - A deeper dive on both their vehicle longevity and their swappable battery advantages. - Why they’re able to finance all their vehicle, and how that improves the capital efficiency of the operations. - How they think about competition, especially from larger players. - How their full time labor model changes regulatory conversations with cities. - How their vehicle type lends itself to longer trips, and the role that they play as a transport option in a suburb with relatively low connectivity options. - How they’re able to end up being a cheaper operator than both Bird and Lime in some markets. - How they were able to learn from Scoot and it’s lessons from San Francisco - Reflections on their safety and insurance practices - Other form factors that would make sense for them to expand into in the future Thanks to this week’s sponsor Particle. Particle provides an end-to-end IoT platform, from device management to connectivity to hardware for connecting micromobility vehicles to networks and reducing complexity as operations scale. For operators that I’ve talked to, they’re a godsend in the world of highly complex and competitive operations. Visit Particle.io/micromobility to learn more and request a free IoT development kit. All podcast listeners will also receive a free consultation. Visit Particle.io/micromobility today.

In this episode, Horace and Oliver host a live podcast recording at The Drivery, an incubator in Berlin in front of an audience. They discuss the upcoming Micromobility Europe conference, disruption of the German car industry and what will disrupt micromobility itself in the future. It was a great conversation! This week we discuss: - Germany’s micromobility explosion and why it’s different from other countries - Why we chose Berlin for the Micromobility Conference in Berlin - Why the intellectual interest in micromobility from the car OEM’s is a textbook disruption response - How automakers will eventually be forced to flee cities - What can we see coming along that will disrupt Micromobility in the future - What would businesses built on micromobility platforms look like? - What form factors we see emerging for colder climates - What the impact of new motors will be on vehicles - Why a marketplace for rides is coming, and what the impacts of these low cost rides will be. “A bit transfer cost has gone to zero. When a human transfer cost goes to zero, then what?’ Thanks to this week’s sponsor Particle. Particle provides an end-to-end IoT platform, from device management to connectivity to hardware for connecting micromobility vehicles to networks and reducing complexity as operations scale. For operators that I've talked to, they're a godsend in the world of highly complex and competitive operations. Visit Particle.io/micromobility to learn more and request a free IoT development kit. All podcast listeners will also receive a free consultation. Visit Particle.io/micromobility today.

In this episode, Oliver and Horace talk about cost-per-mile calculations for micromobility, and the implications of the recent blogpost that Horace published on the Micromobility.io blog (https://micromobility.io/blog/2019/9/9/the-cost-of-a-mile). In short - what happens when the marginal cost per additional km collapses towards zero with Micromobility. We think there are lots of lessons we can take from the telecom industry. Specifically, we cover: - The cost-per-mile calculations from New York for both Citi-Bike and taxis and how they compare to private owned cars - The comparison of shared vs. owned micromobility, and why Horace is far more bullish than Oliver on shared platforms - The jobs-to-be-done of shared vs owned micromobility, and why they’re in many ways different markets - What new behaviours and business opportunities we’re seeing emerge on shared platforms and why scooter trains validate our early thesis about why micromobility is disruptive. - Why Lime and Bird are likely to become the equivalent of Vodafone or Verizon over time - A discussion about whether the social layer for micromobility transport will sit on the vehicle or on the phone of the user. It’s a great discussion with lots of sparring. Hope you enjoy it as much as we did making it!

In this episode, Oliver interviews Martin Mignot, a general partner at Index Ventures and panelist on our ‘Capital in Micromobility’ panel at the upcoming Micromobility Europe conference in Berlin. Index Ventures were early investors in Bird, and have a long history of investing in the micro and macro mobility space over the last 15 years. Specifically, we dug into: - His thesis around investing in mobility companies, and why the smartphone/internet has proved so transformational - Index’s investment in Bird, and why their focus on design and brand differentiates them starkly from the competition - His investment in Cowboy, his bullishness on high end owned micromobility, and how software/hardware integration can create outsized value. - The evolving funding landscape for shared scooters, and how he sees that progressing over the two years. - Why Paris has been a model laboratory for how the market for shared operations will develop over time. - How the pointy end of micromobility tech has started to hit the hard concrete of infrastructure, and how it’s increasingly dragging him into debates about infrastructure. It’s a really fun interview - one of our best so far! Well worth a listen.

In this episode, Oliver interviews Jeff Russakow, CEO of Boosted Boards, makers of the famous electric skateboards and now scooter. Boosted focuses on vehicle-grade owned micromobility, which provides a refreshing counter to the hype around shared models. It’s one of our best episodes to date--highly recommend checking it out! Specifically we cover: - the origins of the company, and how it proves out Horace’s early thesis on the disruptive potential of modularized componentry. - Jeff’s history with lightweight electric vehicles and his eventual coming to Boosted - How they think through their role as manufacturing ‘vehicle grade’ vehicles in the micromobility space, and how this differentiates them from other manufacturers - how their customers use their products - hint: 82% of their customers use them for their commute. - How they think through shared services vs. the owned micromobility market, solving the job-to-be-done of travel and why they’re doubling down on personally owned vehicles - Why they consider their competition the car and not other scooter or board manufacturers. - How they think about safety, why shared scooters have given a lot of people the wrong impression about what micromobility safety can be, and the standards that they build their vehicles to. - How they think about infrastructure for these lightweight vehicles, and where the opportunities are for regulators to harness the benefits. - The challenges that they’ve faced scaling to being a global, growth stage electric vehicle company. - How the venture capital community have viewed them vs the hyped space of shared micromobility. - Hints at their product pipeline and what they find interesting. Key quotes: “What are your options? You can buy a vehicle like ours and you're down to two dollars a day for unlimited mileage and no parking. You can pay $2 a mile for scooter or car share, or you can take your car - it's 40/50 cents a mile between insurance and depreciation and then parking could be $30 a day. So quite literally buying a premium scooter is the cheapest thing you can do.” “It’s been fun for us with the scooter shares because somebody is spending a billion dollars of somebody else's money to put free demos on every street corner on the planet and educate people to the value of these vehicles. There's a bunch of people say, ‘this is great.’ I'm going to use sharing and that's awesome, and then there's a bunch of people who say I like this so much, I’m going to buy one. If they want a vehicle grade one, there's only one. So we're in an interesting market spot.”

In this episode, Horace and Oliver run over Horace’s insights from his recent research using UN data into city-level potential for micromobility markets globally. We run through the most interesting growth trends in 1800+ cities. Specifically we look at: - Contextualising the rapid growth in car-based urbanisation as part of a 5000 year trend - Why Africa is one of the most interesting potential markets between now and 2035. - The cities positioned for both the fastest growth and largest increase. - How the low-income demographics of new migrants to these emerging mega-cities necessitates the need for cheap micromobility transport - Why we should look at auto-ownership rates to understand the 'low-end' potential of micromobility. - The likely business models we'll see emerge with the confluence of autonomy, networking and new propulsion options. - How these vehicles will beat the current incumbents of petrol powered scooters in Asia The things mentioned in the episode are: - The blogpost that Horace has written on the micromobility markets by city. - The talk by Jeremy Grantham re: the majority of increase in global population coming from Africa between now and 2100 - https://youtu.be/cPCblFpqrkI?t=1635 As requested, if anyone has a suggestion for an interview guest for micromobility in India or Africa, please message me on Twitter @oliverbruce. Thanks!

In this episode, Oliver interviews Lawrence Leuschner, CEO and co-founder of Tier, one of Europe’s largest scooter operators with over 6 million cumulative rides to date. Specifically, we cover: - Lawrence’s background as a successful entrepreneur and his motivations for starting Tier - the landscape for micromobility adoption in Europe, and why Europe is better placed to adsorb these transport innovations - we unpack the reasoning behind their unique operational model and more recent moves into custom hardware - reviews of regulations and data standards across Europe, lessons from Paris and why he thinks Germany is the most promising micromobility market - capital efficiency of operations, and how/why European operators differ from Lime and Bird - current and future integrations with public transport systems, and where this is most likely to occur. All in all, a fascinating interview!

In this episode, Horace and Oliver discuss Donald Shoup’s work, The High Cost of Free Parking, and why micromobility offers such a compelling counter to the dominant mindset that has existed around parking for the last 70 years. Specifically, we cover: - the financial and spatial impact of parking minimums in the US - The Catch-22 of parking legislation - parking creates sprawled landscapes that increases the need for them to move around. - The importance of pricing parking appropriately - The odd behaviour that our misplacing of car parks has created in Japan and the US - the logical use case for autonomy in RV’s if we can’t better price/allocate roadspace - Why micromobility offers such a fundamental rethink of space allocation and parking requirements

In this episode, Oliver interviews Sampo Heitanen, CEO of MaaS Global/Whim on their mobility as a service subscription model they have in Helsinki and a number of other markets. Specifically we cover: - How MaaS Global came to be started - The unique context of Helsinki’s regulatory environment and the enabling factors that made it a great first market - The challenges and opportunities of scaling mobility as a service offerings - ticketing, API’s, regulatory barriers and walled gardens - The importance of docked and dockless micromobility in driving down the costs of the subscription model - Their customer demographics and how this has driven their choices around subscription packages - How he thinks about Uber’s walled garden efforts in the mobility as a service space - The role of governments/regulators in encouraging mobility as a service offerings It’s a great conversation about the shift of business models to mobility-as-a-service subscriptions, underpinned by micromobility.

In this episode, Oliver interviews Tiffany Chu (@tchu88), co-founder and COO at Remix to discuss the role of software in helping cities plan for better use of their streets and help them harness the benefits of micromobility. Specifically we cover: - The story of Remix and how they came to found it. - The predominant use cases for cities in utilising their software, and how this helps break down silos within city governments. - The challenges she sees with the rapid growth of micromobility and cities ability to absorb these new vehicles. - How she sees us more rapidly deploying new micromobility friendly infrastructure, and how that pares with the existing political processes in a lot of places - An explanation of MDS and why it’s valuable for city officials - What they’re planning to do with their recent Series B raise - What she would recommend for entrepreneurs thinking of working with governments. Unfortunately we lost a bit of the better quality audio halfway through so have to revert to the backup recording. Apologies. Also, as mentioned in the episode, check out the great Slate article on the MDS debate from David Zipper: https://slate.com/business/2019/04/scooter-data-cities-mds-uber-lyft-los-angeles.html

In this episode, Oliver and Horace discuss a recent trip that Horace made around Continental Europe and reflect on the changing dynamics of shared micromobility business models. Specifically: - The core product, regulatory and operational challenges that are constraining shared mimo companies - The differences between being anti-car and pro-micromobility - The parallels in this market to the mistakes made by the Chinese bikeshare operators, and more historically, the clean tech boom of the late ‘00s. - Why Bird launching the Cruiser was predictable, what the likely next steps will be in terms of product design and how this tracks the early years of the phone industry - An update on Horace’s blogpost ‘The Three Eras of Micromobility’ - The three categories of operators we’ve seen emerge: Independent Mega’s (Bird, Lime), Corporate Parent backed (Jump, Motivate) and Independent Minors (Voi, Tier, Bolt, Circ, etc etc.) and how the capital constraints of each impact their ability to innovate. - How micromobility is not going to be a winner-take-all market As mentioned, the article on the Three Eras of Micromobility by Horace: https://micromobility.io/blog/2019/4/29/the-three-eras-of-micromobility

This week Oliver interviews journalist David Zipper about the quietly brewing war over mobility data that is being played out between cities and shared micromobility operators. David is a Resident Fellow at the German Marshall Fund and a Partner in the 1776 Venture Fund, where he oversees investments in smart cities and mobility ventures. Following his tenure as director of NYC Business Solutions in Mayor Michael Bloomberg's administration in New York City he served as director of Business Development and Strategy for two mayors in Washington, D.C. David has written a number of articles in Slate, Fast Company and The Atlantic covering, among other things, the rise of the Mobility Data Specification which we see as one of the building blocks to supercharge micromobility’s growth, and underpin the future operating systems for mobility in our cities. In this episode, we dig into: - What is the Mobility Data Specifications, and why are they significant? - Who are the major players arguing for or against MDS? - What are the implications of widespread adoption of standards in this space? - What will happen in the event of the preemption bill AB1112 passing in the California Senate, stripping cities of the right to collect the data that MDS provides, including the city that is leading the development of it. It’s a fascinating conversation about the politics playing out at the local and state levels as cities build new solutions. For a more detailed read, check out the article from Slate that David wrote: https://slate.com/business/2019/04/scooter-data-cities-mds-uber-lyft-los-angeles.html Unfortunately the good quality audio on David’s side got cut off around the 30 minute mark, so we default to the Skype recording. As always, let us know what you think on Twitter: @oliverbruce or @davidzipper

In this episode, we release the content from a recent MM Meetup call with Horace where he unpacks 'What makes Micromobility Disruptive?'. This was recorded from a call for our paid subscribers via the Substack newsletter, and grants exclusive access to Horace to ask questions on a monthly basis. It helps support the work that Horace, myself, James, Chase and Luke do to generate content for you guys, and grants you exclusive benefits like discounts to Summits, exclusive swag, early access to content and a community of other micromobility enthusiasts. See more details below. On the call, they cover: - How the current phase of scooters are similar to the Motorola Razr of the mid-late 2000s. - How dependent on infrastructure is Micromobility’s success? What can we learn from the deployment of both cellular and autonomotive infrastructure development? - The difference between adoption and disruption. Why adoption will come regardless, and what about disruption is predictable? How can we use language to track adoption? - What is micromobility actually disrupting? Why is it hard to convince others to see the market for something that is additive. - What segments are existing OEM’s not serving with their car products, and what opportunities does this present to micromobility providers? How is this causing them to flee the low end? - How disruptive are traditional electric vehicles? How is this different? - Micromobility deserts - what will happen in exurban areas? How does this track with the trend of urbanisation? - Christensen says that automobiles weren’t disruptive themselves, but the Model T was. Horace explains why.

In this episode, Oliver interviews Nick Lovett (@nicklovettnz), Transport Policy Planner at the Christchurch City Council in New Zealand. Nick runs the scooter trial with Lime, and has recently expanded the programme to Beam (Singapore) and Flamingo (a local competitor). As noted in earlier episodes, Christchurch has been widely praised for his progressive stance embracing micromobility. In this episode, we dig into the wider lessons both entrepreneurs and regulators can take from Christchurch’s example. Specifically, we cover: - The primary things that entrepreneurs need to understand when dealing with regulators - How regulators like Nick are thinking about the rise of business models like Lime and the new leading programme from Bird - The challenges with having cities adapt quickly to new transport modes, and what entrepreneurs need to watch out for. - What regulators are balancing while seeking to embrace micromobility in their cities.

In this episode, we publish the Software for Micromobility panel from the Micromobility California Summit. In this panel, Stacey Randecker Bartlett (Co-Host, The Flying Car) hosts a conversation with William Henderson (CEO, Ride Report), Tiffany Chu (COO, Remix), Alex Kirn (CEO, INVERS), Jake Sion (COO, Transit App), Victor Pontis (CEO, ScooterMap) about how software is enabling and empowering micromobility to be adopted into cities. Specifically they cover: - Whether they see the emergence of one app to rule them all - How software is integrating these services into a multimodal solution that can replace the job to be done of cars - How software enables the remote fleet management for shared assets - The software that cities are adopting to manage both shared fleets, as well as planning for their roadspace - What cities are starting to learn when they’re empowered with software - How MDS is working and not working for cities and operators - The challenges around privacy in software and open data standards - Their take on the potential for autonomous micromobility Be sure to get your tickets to Micromobility Europe (Berlin, 1st October), as well as sign up to the MM Newsletter at micromobility.io

In this episode, Horace and Oliver discuss Horace's visit to Christchurch, New Zealand for the ITSNZ T-Tech 19 conference. For those that don't know, Christchurch suffered a massive earthquake in 2011, levelling most of downtown and killing 181 people. The city has been rebuilt with great cycle/micromobility infrastructure, which has led to Lime Scooters and cycling as a modal being incredibly popular in the city. In this episode, we unpack: - why the concentration of political power in cities makes them more likely to be able to quickly adapt to micromobility changes - how the earthquake parallels the expected increase in volatility in environment we're likely to see from climate change, and how this benefits micromobility. - how sunk costs in infrastructure can and will hinder the adoption of micromobility, and why this is a mistake. - How the conformability of small vehicles allows them to permeate further into the city substrate in a way that larger vehicles cannot - How transport changes how we relate to cities, and the possibilities that we see with them. - How asset-light models suit an experience driven culture, and how this is a reflection of new forms of status. Be sure to check out micromobility.io for all the latest, sign up to our newsletter, and get tickets for Micromobility Europe which is happening on October 1st. Please also rate the show - it helps us get recommended to others. Cheers and let us know what you think on Twitter - @oliverbruce and @asymco

In this episode, we publish a panel discussion from the Micromobility California Summit in January. Derrick Ko (CEO, Spin), Michael Keating (CEO, Scoot), Sanjay Dastoor (CEO, Skip) and Sergio Romo (CEO, Grin) are interviewed by Cory Weinberg from The Information. They cover: - The scooter landscape as it was in January, and lessons learnt so far - The challenges they've faced ins scaling, and what they foresee ahead - Their changing relationships with cities - Which competitor company they respect the most - How OEM's such as Ford are thinking about the space. - How each of them think about capital raising, and the different approaches taken.

In this episode, Horace and Oliver unpack the Uber S-1 filing, noting, among other things: - The parallels between Uber's assessment of total addressable market and that which we've talked about on the Micromobility podcast. - The economics of short trips, and how these skew towards Micromobility vs Uber's existing rideshare business. - The strategy that makes the most sense for Uber to scale micromobility over the short to mid term. - We discuss the recent Barclays Bank report on micromobility that also further validates Horace's and Uber's analysis of the market potential. We also discuss the Micromobility book, the Micromobility Membership and the upcoming Micromobility Summit in Europe on October 1st. For details on all of this, please head to micromobility.io

New to micromobility? This episode is for you. Been with us all year? There is still plenty of depth and breadth being addressed. In this special episode, Horace and Oliver revisit many of the ideas of the first 20+. It is a great episode for both solidifying one’s understanding and introducing one’s friends and family. Specifically, they cover: - How Horace came to micromobility and why it was so initially captivating - The primary requirement of the micromobility definition (500kg) and the secondary requirements — motor and utility - Recent growth in global production ability and the China bikeshare bubble - The push and pull of micromobility - How success in disruption requires humility for both sides - The various pain points of modern transportation and how micromobility addresses them - Jobs to be done and the markets for micromobility - How the sharing economy allows us to no longer buy for the extremely rare use cases (six sigma) - Applying our intuitive sense for jobs to be done in computing to transportation - The significance of the lognormal distribution for car trips - The evolution rate of micromobility vehicles, which is orders of magnitude greater than that of automobility. - A few predictions - The adoption curve and the disruption principle - Efficiency gains of various modes and environmental impact of micromobility - The exponential growth of scooter companies in 2018 - The maintenance needs and vehicle design needs of shared vehicles

In this episode, Oliver and Horace discuss the Micromobility FAQ's and their significance. Specifically, they cover: - how it's categorised and why this is important - whether autonomous cars will make Micromobility irrelevant - Infrastructure and why and how this is an important question - How should we think about measuring success. The sponsor of the episode is Joyride, a software platform that lets you launch your own bike or scooter share system under your brand, with full consumer facing apps, and backend fleet management and integrations. Check them out at Joyride.city

In this episode, Horace and Oliver discuss the new Micromobility book that is up on Kickstarter. This is the first book from Horace in the space, and outlines why and how micromobility will take over the world. Get your copy here - https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2092675260/micromobility-the-first-year?ref=27ap2v. Next up, Oliver and Michal discuss the latest news including the first Bird Platform launch globally in New Zealand, Voi's recent raise and Jump's latest data from Sacramento. Finally, we release the Venture Capital panel from the recent Micromobility Summit in California. We have Greg Lindsay, Director of Strategy, LA CoMotion moderate a panel with Julie Lien (Founding Partner, Urban Innovation Fund), Reilly Brennan (Founding Partner, Trucks.vc) and Damir Becirovic (Principal, Index Ventures).

In this episode, Horace and Oliver discuss vehicle standards and classifications based on Horace's recent discussions with the Society of Automotive Engineers. Specifically, the cover: - What are automotive standards, why are they important, and how does this change how we look at the world? - The history of the term 'microcomputing' and how the significance of this faded away over time, and what parallels we might be able to see with mobility. - How is the SAE thinking about classifying micromobility vehicles, and what are the likely implications of this - What variables regulators should be thinking about when looking at vehicles, and which they should avoid (hint: speed) - What value the German system for classifying low-powered electric vehicles could offer globally - The parallels to Horace's time at Nokia, and how he foresaw the rise of the battle of iOS and Android.

On today’s episode, Oliver runs over recent news in the scooter/micromobility space with Michal Naka (@michalnaka) and we release the government regulator panel from the recent Micromobility California Summit talking about the experiences from LA, Portland, Oakland and Claremont in regulating scooter operators. In the news section, we discuss: - The emergence of Grin in South America, and what this means for scooters in LatAm. - Lime’s recent $310m raise and how this reflects the consolidation of the rest of the industry. Next, we have the panel from the recent Summit where Katie Fehrenbacher from Greenbiz hosts a panel with: - Seleta Reynolds from the LADOT - Ryan Russo from Oakland DOT - Briana Orr who managed Portland’s Shared Electric Scooter Pilot - Julie Medero, Chair of the Traffic and Transportation Commission from the City of Claremont They cover: - How cities are viewing the rise of micromobility operations as a means of providing access to low-cost mobility and benefitting their citizens. - What cities have learnt from the rise of Uber/Lyft and how that is influencing their regulatory stances with new operators and business models. - How they’re using their ability to regulate to influence data standards and how this will affect operators/entrepreneurs in this space. - The variables that they, as regulators, need to consider as part of rollouts. - How cities are thinking about infrastructure and deployment, and the challenges that they face in rolling out safe infrastructure for micromobility.

On today’s episode we do a very quick recap of the inaugural 2019 Micromobility Summit and then turn our attention to talk through what early stage investment in micromobility looks like with Reilly Brennan of Trucks Venture Capital (@reillybrennan). He is a founding general partner at Trucks (trucks.vc), a seed-stage venture capital fund for entrepreneurs changing the future of transportation. Reilly holds a teaching appointment at Stanford University and is influential newsletter [Future of Transportation](http://www.tinyletter.com/transportation) is a radar for what’s happening in transportation. Prior to Trucks, Reilly was Executive Director for Stanford’s automotive research program, Revs. He is very well known in the transport technology space. In this episode we discuss: - Trucks VC and how it’s adjusted it’s thinking about micromobility in its search for the companies that will power the future of transportation. - How he thinks about the evolution of the supply chain in the micromobility sector, and who will be looking to get involved. - Where he sees parallels between the existing early stages of micromobility and the autonomous vehicle space a few years ago. - What opportunities he is looking for in the space, and his thesis of where value will accrue. We also discuss the new Micromobility VC syndicate on AngelList that will be syndicating interesting deals in the micromobility space out to early stage investors. If you are an accredited investor and would like to hear about the deals that Horace, Oliver and others are coming across and backing, please find us on [AngelList](http://5by5.tv/micromobility/angel.co) and apply.

On today’s show we have Boyd Cohen, CEO of Iomob, to discuss building a marketplace operating system for city transportation, and what is enabled having all modes of transport interoperable and discoverable. Specifically, we dig into: - What the benefits to customers and operators are for an open marketplace for mobility. - Why micromobility is specifically well suited to open marketplaces/interoperability. - Why Boyd doesn’t think the current scooter/micromobility operators will survive in their current form. - The benefits and pitfalls of having system wide integrations for all transport options. - How this will scale in the face of competition from Uber, Google Maps and others.

In this episode, we have Steve Anderson (@Rashomon2) as a guest on the podcast. Steve has a long history in motorcycle safety and engineering forensics, and more recently has been working on low powered electric vehicles. He will be speaking at the upcoming Micromobility Summit in California on the 31st of January. We cover: - The role of vehicle design, infrastructure and speed in micromobility safety. - The coming emergence of different form factors, including cabin motorcycles and enclosed cargo trikes - Different avoidance and damage mitigation options for micromobility. - Helmets — their impact and how their role in micromobility. Be sure to check out the Danish airbag helmet, the [Hovding](http://hovding.com/). - The role of fun and joy in micromobility’s appeal.

On today’s show, Horace and Oliver talk through the challenges that vandalism poses to the shared micromobility model. Specifically we cover: - The core drivers of vandalism of such fleets, and how this compares to historical parallels. - The implications for capex vs. opex - The calculations that operators are making to ensure that the services still function well.

On today’s episode, Horace and Oliver dig deep into the evolution of business models in transport, and how micromobility lays the foundation for the next great shift of interoperable, efficient, low-cost transport services powered by blockchain. I think we just hit peak hype words, but bear with us! We cover: - How the car was the first great bundling of transport ‘jobs-to-be-done’ into a single option — kickstarting the first major productization of transport. - The emergence of Uber, and the shift of trips from pre-paid product to service. - The dynamics of vehicle fleets, and why scooter/e-bike fleets are likely to move off-balance sheet for most large operators in the near future. - How multimodality, especially that underpinned by micromobility, lends itself to open transport systems, and how this will give rise to token marketplaces for trips (similar to Bitcoin developer Mike Hearn’s tradenet proposal ). - The impact that decentralized token marketplaces will have on cities. It’s a conceptually dense episode as we explore the Productization-Servitization-Securitization-Tokenization (Pro-Se-Sec-To Framework?).

On today’s episode, Oliver talks with Regina Clewlow (@reginaclewlow), CEO of Populus.ai about her insights gained from building micromobility data dashboards for city officials. We discuss what matters to cities, and why the rise of micromobility data will drive the changes in streetscapes across the world. We also discuss: - The new data standards emerging for operators in cities, and how this will help both operators and cities better manage fleets, and cities to develop more appropriate infrastructure. - The new partnership they’ve developed with Lime to monitor their LimePod car sharing in Seattle, and how that lays the foundation for fixing the tragedy of the commons problems with scooter parking. - The report that Populus has produced for DC looking at equity of access to dockless mobility services vs more traditional docked services and why this matters to cities.

In this episode we discuss the recent Bird Platform announcement, why this was predictable given the dynamics of the market, and how franchising might evolve in the future. We also cover: - Dediu’s Law: Horace’s thesis that we’ll see 10x growth annually for the next 5–6 years in micromobility trip numbers. - How challenges related to social technologies like local bureaucracy/current scooter caps will be overcome. - The [VeloMetro/Veemo shared covered trike system](https://www.velometro.com/) that has emerged in Vancouver and whether this is likely to catch on.

On today’s episode, we’re joined by Dr Chris Cherry (@drchrischerry), Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Tennessee and Director of Light Electric Vehicle Education and Research (LEVER) Initiative, an international academic/industry research consortium on lightweight and low speed EV’s about the environmental and social implications of micromobility. We discuss: - How China’s electric micromobility sector has grown to lead the world, and how Chris and his colleagues have worked to understand it. - The framework that they use to understand the benefits that lightweight electric utility vehicles offer users — notably low cost, point to point, low emission transport. - The emission and energy use of micromobility vehicles compared to other options. - How to think about whether micromobility is additive or substitutive trips vs. incumbent modes of transport. - What the role of fun plays in micromobility adoption. - Which cities will benefit the most from the ride of micromobility and why.

In today’s episode, we’re joined by Twitter micromobility celebrity Michal Naka (@michalnaka), to talk about scooters, how they’re evolving in hardware and their interactions with cities and what the future might look like. It’s a packed episode. Specifically we cover: - How Michal ended up in micromobility through his skepticism of autonomous cars. (5:50->) - How the most valuable miles travelled are likely to be addressed by micromobility and not autonomous. (9:20->) - The history of the scooter supply chain.(13:00->) - The tradeoff that companies are making between opex and capex. (25:50->) - What future evolutions we’re likely to see in (29:30->) - How cities are responding to these new business models, and what we’re likely to see in the future. (33:46->) - How the diffusion theory applies to scooters and their evolution. (40:30->)

On today’s episode Horace and Oliver are joined by Winston Kwon, Assistant Professor of Strategy and Social Innovation at the University of Edinburgh Business School. We discuss mobility poverty, why it matters and the role that micromobility could play in improving access to opportunities. We also touch on: - The concept of Universal Basic Mobility (as put forward by Alex Roy) and how micromobility might enable it - The importance of social inclusion — and how transport, specifically cars, impact it. - How the homogeneity of suburbs is accelerating their infrastructural decline. - Which cities/built environments will benefit the most from micromobility and which will be the most negatively impacted. - Horace revises his estimates for the Total Addressable Market for Micromobility globally.

In today’s episode we unpack more about the latest data on micromobility adoption, what this implies for the total addressable market of micromobility and then run over the details of the upcoming Micromobility California event. Specifically, we touch on: - The speed of adoption curves for scooters compared to other technology platforms in the past. - The environmental impacts that we might be able to imply from using lightweight electric vehicles - Who will be attending the Micromobility California event, as well as who might find it interesting. - The details on who will be presenting.

In today’s show, we examine the role of platforms in micromobility’s rise, and what role they might play in furthering adoption. Specifically, we cover: - What an entry into the micromobility space might look like for Apple, and how their experience in interface stepchanges puts them at a unique advantage - How autonomous cars are analogous to wormholes vs. a more tactile engaging experience of the world with micromobility. - What a platform built on a micromobiltiy fleet might look like, and what it might enable, and what names we might give to these experiences in the same way that cars have crusing, drivethrus and cinemas. - The stage of the market, and the parallels to the Playstation vs Xbox argument - How the network effects of micromobility sharing platforms are inverse to the traditional car infrastructure - Horace introduces his new research paper looking at modal shifts with the introduction of e-mobility in a cities transport mix.

Micromobility has an addressable market of more than $1.4 trillion dollars annually in the US alone, a figure that makes it more valuable than longer distance transport addressable by cars ($1.1 trillion). That’s the message in this episode where we run through the talk ‘When Micromobility Attacks’ that Horace gave at the recent Micromobility Summit in Copenhagen. Be sure to check out the slides — have also included the relevant ones below. We look at: - How US trip data typically exhibits log-normal distributions (and an explanation of what this means!) - How many of the 2 trillion vehicle trips taken in the US annually would potentially be served by micromobility - How Marchetti’s constant (one hour of travel a day) relates to micromobility’s benefits- how adoption of micromobility would impact car demand, and why this is relevant to automakers- why these high volume, short trips are actually more valuable than average car trips on a dollar basis. - How time spent traveling will actually drive adoption of micromobility in highly congested cities. - Why 3 times more time is spent on short trips than longer trips in vehicles, and the implications for micromobility - The impacts this explosion in micromobility might have on carbon emissions and how we can measure that

In this episode, we look at the history of the Dutch cycle infrastructure, the symbiotic tension that we'll see between micromobility and autonomous vehicles, and the intangible quality of cities with vibrant micromobility ecosystems. We also cover: - the recent spate of news re: the dawning scooter wars (Bird, Lime, Jump) - San Francisco's highway history - the cost comparisons for cycling infrastructure vs. car infrastructure, especially when compared to modal share vs. land-use in European cities. - How the rollout of cycling infrastructure parallels (or doesn't) the rollout of cellular infrastructure in both the US and Europe. - the creative tension that will exist between micromobility vehicles vs. autonomous cars (walkable neighborhoods vs. exurbia sprawl) - the 'experience' factor of micromobility, and the unquantifiable value of the thrill of riding a scooter/e-bike vs. passive A-B transport and how this is influenced by the European vs. American views of the world.

On today's episode Horace and Oliver are joined by Corinne Vogel, head of operations at Smide bikeshare based in Zurich, Switzerland. Smide is a high-end e-bike share system, with speed pedelec bikes that travel up to 30mph/45kph. It's using a completely different approach to the rapid blanket approach from e-scooter rollouts we're seeing elsewhere. It's a fascinating discussion. Specifically, we touch on: - who and what their customers are, why they choose Smide over other options and how this parallels to iPhone market positioning. - the importance of having good relationships with cities (and how they're loved by the governments they work with) - their unique crowdlending model for financing the launch of new cities - how they deploy user incentives to help load-balance the network, and the importance of having vehicles that go >70km / 50miles per charge As always, let us know what you think on Twitter at @asymco or @oliverbruce. Thanks!

In today’s show we cover the rise of scooter sharing and how different localized constraints result in different micromobility solutions blooming. Specifically: - The scooter sharing model that Bird pioneered, why it emerged in Santa Monica and why it might not apply to other contexts. - The history from the Segway to the hoverboard, Boosted Board and on to the current scooter form factor. - The local variables that need to be considered for micromobility fleet operators. - The parallels of the rise of micromobility with early cellular, and the Galapagos scenario of ecosystem development.

In this episode, we look at Marchetti's constant and why commute times tend to aggregate at under 1 hour per day. In this episode we also cover: - How the 1 hour daily commute has been a constant across time, and how that affects how our cities form. - What the Marchetti's constant is, and how it has driven the explosion in shared scooters and bikes. - The Segway, why it failed and what it can teach us about the emergent micromobility phenomena. - The problems with traditional bikeshare systems, and why new layers of technology have helped this. - The power-network-intelligence matrix for thinking about emergent trends in micromobility. - How networks can creatively use incentives to solve for the limitations of the vehicles

In this episode, we refine the micromobility categorisation and unpack why urban infrastructure is a leading indicator to adoption. We run through: 1) Why the development of batteries and small electric motors underpinned the development of micromobility, the importance of off-the-shelf componentry in providing the basis for innovation and why electric will be the dominant powertrain for the coming 10 years. 2) The history of fuel infrastructure in the US, how hard this is to replicate, and why micromobility provides an opportunity to leapfrog this. 3) The history of transit, roading and tramways in major cities globally, and how they provided the conditions for the development of the car. 4) The significance of the standard bike as we know it today, and the impact that it had on society. 5) The emergence of cars in cities, the safety battles fought, and the development of signals, licensing and traffic segmentation, and the implications on that for alternative vehicle types. 6) How the emergence of micro mobility will terraform our cities in the same way that the car did.

In this episode, we define the term micromobility and what is/isn’t in the categorization. We run through: 1) Why micromobility can be defined as utility focussed urban transport in sub 500kg vehicles, and predominantly electrically powered. 2) The background of how Horace came to see micromobility’s potential to disrupt the automobile industry. 3) Why e-bikes are some of the best city-based transportation mode option- hint: it’s the fastest way across town and can be parked anywhere. 4) How to think about the categorization of different types of micromobility devices, and why that matters. 5) How the development of micromobility is paralleling the development of personal computing and why we’re still in 1976. 6) Why car obesity has provided ripe opportunity to develop micromobility options in the marketplace. 7) The key difference between invention and innovation and how this applies to micromobility. Bonus! Why Horace thinks that riding an electric bike is more thrilling than driving a Porsche. Transcript of this show is available on our show page.

In this inaugural episode, we outline the key themes and issues we want to address in the show series including: 1) Defining micromobility - what is it, where did it come from and why does it matter? 2) The disruptive potential of micromobility. With this, we will unpack why the current fixation on autonomy with automobiles is misplaced, and what a distributed, connected robot of micromobility vehicles might look like. 3) The great unbundling of the car - what does it mean, and why the micromobility was required to make multimodality a feasible unbundled option for travel. 4) How the emergence of micro mobility tracks the development of the early days of computing, and why we’re still really in 1976 with the emergence of the Apple I. 5) How disruption from the low end induces demand and drives such steep adoption curves. We also unpack why their scale will permit the development of large scale computation platforms, especially vs. traditional car platforms. 6) The impact of the emergence of micromobility on infrastructure and how cities function. 7) How the business models of this might emerge, how securitisation of the assets deployed will enable rapid deployment, and lay the foundations for tokenised solutions that align the interests of users, operators and investors together. We also hit Marchetti’s constant (time budgets for travel) and log normal distributions of travel time. We end on a thought experiment on how teleportation would change everything.