Uber fights NYC and finds taxi friends in the UK, Dubai 1M DRT; Deliveroo Australia -$120M in 2022; and DfT & Fluctuo micromobility insights.

Ride-Hailing & Taxi, Buses & DRT  🚙🚐

Uber is suing the New York City Taxi & Limousine Commission (TLC) to block rate increase for drivers. TLC voted to raise prices for ride-hailing drivers a month ago, increasing the per-minute rates of ride-hail drivers by 7.42% and per-mile rates by 23.93%. Uber is calling the move “dramatic, unprecedented and unsupported hikes” and says the rule would force it to spend an additional $21 million to $23 million per month on drivers, which could result in a 10% increase for riders, something the company wants to avoid. The hearing is set for January 31st. 

Dubai’s DRT scheme reached 1 million riders since launched in February 2020 with Via. The service has 13 10-seater vehicles, which means that in the almost three years it has operated (much of it during covid, which required social distancing), average ridership was circa 100 riders a day per vehicle! I’ve double checked these numbers with the RTA, the operator, and they confirmed. At these numbers, this is one of the most successful DRT operations I’ve come across. 

In Germany, a Clever Shuttle DRT service that commenced in December 2021, had 35,000 passengers so far and is being extended. BusUp to launch a new service in Pierce County, Washington State, USA. Grab launches a tuk tuk service in Phuket, Thailand. 

Uber Local expands in the UK. The service allows rides to book taxis via the Uber app. Lyft is offering incentives to drivers to switch to EVs. The scheme, offering drivers an additional $150 a week and other benefits, is only available in California. Lyft wants to be 100% electric by 2030. Yango launches Yango Maps (similar to Google Maps) for the Ghanaian market. FlixBus partners with Shell to introduce bio-LNG fuel for the FlixBus fleet. FlixBus focuses on intercity long travel, and are looking beyond the electric vehicle. Grab freezes hiring and salaries. Grab, which operates in 480 cities across eight countries in Southeast Asia, is looking to reach profitability.  BluSmart is looking to close a $200M series B round. A look at mobility startups in Latin America. 

Getaround SPACed on December 9th, at a $1.2bn valuation. The stock, debuted at $8.82 per share, is now (end of trade Friday 16th, a week after debut) $1 only. 

Micromobility 🚲🛴

The DfT (Department for Transport, UK) published its national e-scooter evaluation. The 121 page report has tons of data for any micromobility lover, Key takeaways for the exec summary: a total of 32 trials across 55 areas since July 2020; 14.5 million rides until December 2021; average e-scooter trial trip length was 2.2km and took 14 minutes; users were predominantly male (71%) and under the age of 35 (74%); 5% of e-scooter users had experienced a collision in the last 12 months; most rides, 33%, were for commute. For more amazing data. 

European Shared Mobility Index Q3/22 by fluctuo. Key takeaways: 33 cities with 408 services; 100M trips in Q3/22, up 20% YoY; average of 1.9 trips per vehicle per day; Fleet size of 525,000 vehicles, up 52% YoY; and much more here. 

The UK government decides to delay the planned legalisation of private e-scooters. Some warn of companies potentially going under because of the delays 

Tuk Tuk, a new scooter company, enters Los Angeles. RideUp, cycling subscription provider,  launches UK network of 22 cycle centres. These centres will provide the logistic backbone for deliveries and services for RideUp. Angry Bird by Oversharing. The company is strapped for cash, and is emailing customers for unsettled bills. All the customers, even those who owe less than a dollar. 

Helbiz raised $5M. Whoosh, a Russian electric scooter company, plans to raise up to $80 million at a $400 million valuation in a Moscow IPO.

Delivery 🍽🧺

Deliveroo was never profitable in Australia and incurred losses of more than $120 million in 2022 alone, administrator’s report says. Deliveroo has been present in Australia since 2015, which makes you wonder how much cash has been sunk in the country all this time. 

Fyrtel.market say they found the secret sauce to operational profitability: Next-day delivery + food cloud (stock from local suppliers) + cargo bike deliveries. 

Foodpanda partners with Huawei to pre-install its app on new mobile devices across Southeast Asia. Uber Eats will use Cartken’s sidewalk robots to make food deliveries in Miami. Amazon to shut down food-delivery business in India. Food delivery apocalypse news roundup. . 

Autonomous 🤖

The Navetty research project (France), run by Transdev, EasyMile and others, is moving to L4 autonomous shuttles, i.e. without a safety operator. Ohmio, founded in New Zealand, plans to launch a driverless bus in Luxembourg in the summer of 2023. Autonomous vehicles join the list of US national security threats. AVs collect massive amounts of data, and authorities fear security threats by Chinese firms operating in the US. Man jumps onto the road to see if a Cruise autonomous car would stop. It did. 

Manufacturers 🛺⚡️

Sono Motors is launching a crowdfunding campaign to save project Sion, the company’s solar powered car, after failing to raise capital from investors. There have been 20,000 orders of the vehicle, and now Sono Motors are aiming for 3,500 full down payments, which will enable the business to continue production and avoid major layoffs. After 5 days, the company is at the 500 milestone (out of 3.5K). Good luck. 

Rivian and Mercedes ‘pause’ plans to produce electric commercial vans, just three months after the partnership was announced. 

In other news 📰

Uber supported over 100,000 rides in Ukraine. Donations in this link. 

How did the gig economy do in the polls so far? A look at Portland, Washington DC and Washington State. In Spain, Uber settled after firing 4,000 employees ahead of new labour laws (this is back in 2021). 

Autofleet launches the first self-service electrification simulator (disclaimer: I work here).