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- Buses, cars and airport shuttles are on the rise - quick-delivery continues to contract.
Buses, cars and airport shuttles are on the rise - quick-delivery continues to contract.
Go-Ahead acquired; Optibus has a new vision and product; Jokr, Ninja Delivery and Grab q-commerce downsizing; Hyundai launches RoboTaxi; Airport shuttles and GTM raising, Lime out of South Korea and new product in LA; Massachusetts deals (temp) blow to gig companies; a new Global P2P car-sharing map and more with Distribution, Kakao Mobility, Koi ride, Kolors, Superpedestrian, Helbiz, Zypp Electric, Human Forest In this week of #movingpeople (now also on substack!). Let’s start.
Go-Ahead once, twice, sold! 🚌💰
🚌 Go-Ahead accepts £650M takeover bid from Kinetic (Australian bus operator) and transport infrastructure company Globalvia. Go-Ahead will keep its current structure and management, and the buyers are looking for Go-Ahead to continue its growth,
💰 The UK bus market is ‘on fire’, after Stagecoach’s acquisition by a German asset management company and First Group rejecting a £1.2bn offer from a US PE. These investors definitely see an upside in the future of UK bus and rail, building on government subsidies for green vehicles and better transport; young people's willingness to use buses more than their parents; and expected post-pandemic boosts in valuations.
Ride-hailing / car-sharing 🚙🚘
Global P2P car-sharing map by Geraldine Priya. We’re familiar with names such as Turo, Getaround and Hiyacar, but there is more to it on this map.
Distribusion, a Berlin-based technology platform for ground transportation, raised €30M in series B. Distribution enables online retail booking (demand), carrier onboarding platform (supply) and the marketplace to connect both. The company works with big names such as Amadeus, Skyscanner, Trainline and Checkmybus. The money will be used to expand beyond Europe and LATAM.
Kakao, South Korean publicly-traded internet company, is considering selling its Kakao Mobility subsidiary, taxi-hailing company, to MBK Partners, a private-equity firm. Kakao Mobility is profitable, bringing in $21.2M in net profits last year with 10 million active users.
KOI Ride, UAE-based B2B ride-hailing, raised $3M + $15M in equity and convertible bond. The company focuses on airport shuttles, with services in 10 (touristic) cities.
Careem implemented anonymous calling, for people who wish not to share their number with the driver. Uber expands airport reservation service to 55 airports around the world. Liftango backs the Wednesday Challenge in New Zealand with its car-sharing solution.
Bus & DRT tech 🚍📱
Optibus launches ‘Optibus Operations’, a software tool for managing service disruptions and driver and vehicle allocations in real time. This marks Optibus’s departure from ‘only’ planning to provide an (new vision->) “end-to-end software for transport planning and operations”.
Kolors, Mexican digital booking intercity bus service, is adopting airlines methods - flight bus attendant and sales of food and snacks onboard - to attract the premium consumer. The startup just closed a $20M series A from big names, and will use the funds to expand in Mexico, the US and LATAM and to improve the tech.
Micromobility 🛴🚲
Lime is testing a new shared electric motorbike in California. The bike can reach speeds of up to 20mph and range of up to 30 miles on a single charge. Soon in Long Beach, Los Angeles.
Lime is withdrawing from South Korea, due to government regulation and policies. In 2021 ridership dropped due to a newly introduced mandatory helmet law; current towing rules are strict; and minimum age and licence laws have recently changed and made the market even more unattractive. Neuron Mobility and Wind have both suspended operations back in 2021, but Lime says the door is still open for it to return, if regulation improves.
Superpedestrian and Helbiz to partner with Populus to gather data. The project is funded by the US government and aims to offer predictive analysis for transportation planners. Dott and BAQME partner to launch e-bike (Dott) and e-cargo (BAQME) service in Belgium. Riders could book either bike, and maintenance will be managed by Dott. Dublin Bus partners with Voi to give its employees access to e-bikes to be used to travel between their eight depots in the city, also gaining insights on e-bikes usage in the city. FREE NOW integrates e-bikes from Human Forest.
Delivery 🍽🧺
Jokr cuts back on US operations to focus on Latin America and prepares to cut ±5% of the workforce. The company raised $260M in November,
Is Ninja Delivery gone? The Toronto quick-delivery service had stopped suddenly, but the Ninjas say that the temporary(!) closure is due to changes in the store and that they will “have some news to share soon”. I sense an acquisition.
Grab closes quick-commerce operations in Bandung, Indonesia. Interestingly, the company isn’t pulling out from the market, but says that consumers prefer more products less quickly, and that future operations will focus on ‘normal’ delivery. Quick-commerce is still in play in Jakarta.
Zypp Electric, Indian e-scooter rental for delivery couriers and ride-hailing, is experiencing increasing ride-hailing demand, contributed to by the shortage of drivers at Uber and Ola. This is true to other players in the market, such as Rapido and Yulu.
Glovo in a possible interesting move to bypass courier employment status: having riders bill restaurants directly. Restaurants don’t seem to like the solution as it requires them to deal with multiple invoices. Apparently the pilot has been stopped for now.
GM’s Brightdrop, last mile delivery, acquires Marain, fleet optimisation software. The plan is to integrate Marain’s solution into the Brightdrop’s stack.
Grab bought and brought back to life HungryGoWhere food review site. The site, founded in 2006, closed during the pandemic.
Manufacturers 🛺
Renault acquired online car maintenance Fixter, as the company digitises its aftersales operations. Fixter allows people to manage their car maintenance easily with vetted garages and fair pricing.
Goodbye Last Mile Solutions. The electric commercial vehicle manufacturer is filing for bankruptcy. The company SPACed at a $1.4bn valuation back in June 2021, and since then have seen SEC investigations of senior leadership, workforce cuts and a public dispute with accounting firm BDO due to a late filing.
Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) implemented what3words into its navigation system.
Flying cars 🚁☁️
Blade expanding in France, in talks to acquire three air mobility (helicopter) businesses, The company recently crossed over to Europe from North America, and is looking at further expansion into Europe.
Autonomous 🤖
Hyundai is launching robotaxis in Gangnam district, Seoul. Safety driver included, and the service will first be open only for Hyundai’s employees. For the service to be operational, all traffic lights have been replaced with ‘smart lights’ that interact with the car.
In other news 📰
Top Swiss court rules that Uber is an employer.
A court in Massachusetts threw out a proposed (by ride-hailing & delivery companies) ballot measure to determine if workers are employees or independent contractors. $17.8M have already been invested on the campaign by the gig companies. Note, that the reason wasn’t because the court was in favour of drivers classified as employees, it had to do more with the language and technicalities of the ballot proposed. It is still a win for those who wish for gig workers to be classified as employees. For now. More on this in New York Times, Politico, The Guardian, CNN.
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