[ad_1]
Time has come. Electric scooter sharing services are returning to the streets of San Francisco – this time with the express permission of the SF Municipal Transportation Agency. On Monday, Skip and Scoot will deploy their respective electric scooters throughout the city.
And if you remember the situation at the beginning of the year, you will probably notice that these scooters are different from those previously scattered throughout the city. In March, several electric scooters from Bird, Lime and Spin first appeared in San Francisco overnight. This prompted city officials to act quickly: the San Francisco City Attorney's Office sent letters of termination and forbearance, a new municipal law prohibiting electric scooter companies from operating without a license and, ultimately, SFMTA creating a licensing process.
But the licensing process and the resulting decision did not work in the direction of companies like Lime and Lyft, which had not been licensed to operate electric scooter services in San Francisco. Towards the end of this week, Lime has clearly announced his intention to block the deployment of scooters on Monday. One judge, however, rejected Lime's request for a temporary restraint order. Lyft also petitioned SF Mayor London Breed for a look at the SFMTA's decision. Despite the efforts of Lyft and Lime, the big deployment of electric scooters in 2018 is still on Monday.
Before the official launch, TechCrunch discussed with Scoot Michael Keating, CEO, and Sanjay Dastoor, CEO of Skip, present their respective deployments of 625 electric scooters.
Scoot CEO Michael Keating at a pre-launch event in the Bayview neighborhood of San Francisco
Given the number of scooters that Scoot is allowed to deploy, the company has chosen a relatively concentrated area to deploy them, Keating said. The number of hills in the area was also taken into account because "it's not really a San Francisco climbing machine", while ensuring that it serves a traditionally underserved area. And that's how he landed on Bayview, where Scoot hosted a media event on Friday.
"Part of the reason were right here East this we teamed up with This group called the Renaissance entrepreneurship Center, "said Keating.
The Renaissance Entrepreneurship Center, which has been in existence for 33 years, helps entrepreneurs create and grow their businesses.
"The thought is we want to at to rent of the the communities this we function inside, says Keating. "And so we wanted to at fundamentally make some connections down right here and let people right here know this if they want to at job onot electric vehicles and be part of this nice of green economy this were hiring. "
SAN FRANCISCO, CA – SEPTEMBER 06: Skip's co-founder and CEO, Sanjay Dastoor, will perform on stage at the second day of TechCrunch Disrupt SF 2018 at the Moscone Center on September 6, 2018 in San Francisco, California. California. (Photo by Kimberly White / Getty Images for TechCrunch)
Skip says his coverage map is still being finalized with the SFMTA, but his scooters will cover much of the Marina, North Beach, Embarcadero to Chinatown, the Financial District, South of Market, and neighborhoods of Bayview and Excelsior. According to the request, Dastoor has said that Skip can adjust some of these deployments.
Over the weekend, Skip is taking part in community outreach and motorcycle activities to make sure people know how to ride scooters safely. The company also offers helmets.
Skip hosts community event at Cole Valley on Saturday, October 13, 2018
"We saw a very positive response from everyone we spoke to about the dialogue with the community," said Dastoor.
San Francisco is Skip's third market after its launch in Washington, then Portland. According to D. Dastoor, one of the teachings of Skip at D.C. is that people like to get in touch with society, whether they are runners or not.
Scoot, who operates moped scooters since 2012 in San Francisco, says he started thinking about electric scooters early last year. Given his ongoing relationship with SFMTA, Mr. Keating said he was confident that his company would be able to operate scooters in the city.
"The confidence comes from the fact that we were the first company to offer shared electric vehicles in this format," Keating told me.
Although these scooters are different from mopeds, Scoot has experience in using shared electric vehicles that people go to and that they unlock with their phones.
"And we to have summer job with the city for a while, "said Keating.So we nice of know what the city is concerned sure. They care sure security, they care sure inclusion, and they care sure responsibility. And then we when we wrote our application, we m said& # 39; Wto one, were bringing all this experience correctly now these things, & # 39; which was, frankly, do not a strength of the other business. They are get a lot of vehicles sure the road, but do not keeping their sure the road. "
Part of Scoot's strategy to keep scooters on the road is to use replaceable batteries. Scooters will stay on the streets instead of having 1099 contractors to bring them home, load them overnight and then redeploy them in the morning, Keating said. However, Skip uses fixed batteries and relies on a combination of its own workers and subcontractors to load them.
Skip and Scoot report working to add locking systems to their respective scooters. Scoot also says he's exploring the storage of helmets on scooters – similar to what he offers with his mopeds.
As for Lime's efforts to get on the road, Keating said, "They're doing flip-flops, that's what they did." how Scoot has been using electric vehicles for years. Of course, they are different, but "we chose something heavier, more expensive and more complicated, but we excel at it".
Although Judge Harold E. Kahn rejected Lime's request for a temporary no-contact order, Mr. Lime said it was still a victory.
"Our goal of pursuing this lawsuit was not to prevent other operators from going forward; It was about exposing the flawed and flawed process of SFMTA, "Lime spokesman Jack Song told TechCrunch by e-mail. "The Court has recognized and further hearings to come."
But even if it does not change anything, there are many other markets to win. Uber, for example, recently launched electric scooters in Santa Monica, California, and Lyft launched its own scooters in Denver, Colorado in September. For an overview of all things electric scooters, be sure to check out the TechCrunch's additional cover below.
Source link
