Uber Invests in Scooter Rental Company Lime

cageymaru

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The New York Times is reporting that Uber has made a significant investment into the scooter rental company Lime. Lime was recently able to secure an additional $335 million in overall fund raising which elevated the value of the company to $1.1 billion. Uber has gained the right to display Lime scooters as a rental option in their app and some Lime scooters will bear the Uber logo. At $1 to unlock the scooter and $0.15 a minute to ride, the Lime scooter rental experience seems to be priced appropriately.

Uber's CEO Dara Khosrowshahi is positioning Uber as a hub of transportation activity so the cross-branding makes sense; but I have yet to see how either company is going to handle the problems with bike returns. In many cities where these bike and scooter rental companies do business, the customers aren't parking the returned vehicles properly. It has led to articles like this detailing the stacks of jumbled bikes in Dallas left by customers of Limebike and others. San Franciscans are not happy about this either. That all said, Bird Hunters have shown that scooter collection can lead to fun and profit.

Uber’s investment in Lime is part of a furious land grab in the transportation world. After Uber acquired Jump in April, Lyft said it was also getting into bike-sharing. Last week, Lyft said it was buying Motivate, the parent company of CitiBike and other similar programs in American cities. The financial terms were not disclosed, but media reports said Lyft was in talks to pay about $250 million for the company.
 
i would steal a bunch of these scooters and disassemble them
 
People throw them in the lake in Oakland all the time. I kick them into the bushes when they park them in the middle of the sidewalk.

Fuck these companies. I’m gonna run them over with the diesel pickup next.
 
Scooters . . . . San Francisco. . . .human waste in the streets and on sidewalks. I would not even touch one of those damn bikes. Who knows where it has been.
 
Would be nice to rent one of those to take me to Uber's "pool express" pickup locations. /s

Nice to have it all in one app down the line though, then I could decide to grab one of these to go to the park nearby instead.

i would steal a bunch of these scooters and disassemble them

Then you would be a criminal, probably not a good career choice.
 
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Not sure why people blame the scooter companies for terrible human beings who throw them in lakes, trash cans, etc.

Root cause = don't be a douche. They're super cheap and great over distances in between the break-even point of too long to walk, too short to drive, which in an urban area like San Francisco are quite a few.
 
Then you would be a criminal, probably not a good career choice.

Only if you get caught. It's simple really. We start up a scooter chop shop. Bring them in, and turn them into fun little go-karts and things, then sell them to kids on the black market. Smooth as silk!
 
yeah, decouple the battery pack and any tracker, repaint. reuse.
 
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