Smash Notes
#0009 – the Scooter Frenzy Provides a Startup Business Opportunity
Over the past year, electric scooter startups have erupted as the next set of startups with billion-dollar valuations and unicorn status. Companies like Bird, Spin, Lime, and others have taken on large investments from Alphabet, Uber, Lyft and more. The problem that electric scooters are solving is very clear, they are helping ridesharing companies to cut…
Notes
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On Somewhat Frank, host Frank Gruber says South by Southwest in Austin filled with electric scooters in a single year, the way Taipei is full of mopeds parked on every curb. He names Bird, Lime, and Spin, already valued in the billions, with Uber, Alphabet, and others funding the growth. The scooters take the two- or three-block trips that are a poor deal for Uber and Lyft drivers. Gruber also calls them dangerous. He almost got hit, a friend was hurt falling off one, almost nobody wore a helmet, and he watched riders go the wrong way down Sixth Street at night. Lyft had sent a scooter-etiquette guide before the festival. He says people ignored it.
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People treat the scooters and their usage as a toy. You are going 15 miles an hour down the road, and you've got people and other cars. It is not simple. Yet, because getting a scooter via an app is so easy, people don't feel the appropriate degree of caution. Most people don't even wear a helmet.
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Most of these companies do not seem to provide helmets for riders. Perhaps there is room for a company that could become a helmet vendor to all of the scooter sharing startups.