Movements | September 11th, 2020

Tele-operated scooters, used bike marketplace raises $12 million, and so much more!

Sep 11, 2020

Issue [#103] - Brought to you by Michal Naka and Adam Feldman. Join thousands of others who receive this analysis and curation of emerging mobility news in their inbox every week — subscribe now.

If you’re finding this newsletter valuable, consider sharing it with friends 🤜🤛

Micromobility

German direct-to-consumer bike company, Canyon, teased a new covered eBike concept vehicle. | Canyon

Tortoise shows off it’s new teleoperated “Tortoise Cart” delivery vehicle. The vehicle can carry 100+ pounds of delivery food and groceries in modular containers. | Tortoise HQ
Teleoperated scooters caught on camera repositioning in San Jose. | Complex
Zoba details their approach to demand prediction and dynamic pricing for shared mobility services. | Zoba

Product Launches & Updates

CurbFlow launches its new ‘virtual curbFlow’ product in Washington DC with its anchor customer DoorDash. This product provides delivery drivers and fleet operators with real time insights into curb availability in high density areas of town. The way it works is that curbFlow partners with local merchants and gives them a computer vision device (camera + embedded software) that monitors curb utilization. With making curbs legible to software systems, this could unlock a bunch of interesting use cases in transportation. | curbFlow
Washington DC and Los Angeles public transit systems launch Apple Pay support. | 9to5mac
Sixt launches a monthly car subscription service in the United States. | Fleet World
Google Maps launches more sophisticated traffic predictions with dramatically improved real-time ETAs based on a collaboration with Deep Mind. | DeepMind

Ridehailing, Carsharing, & Delivery

Uber will be requiring riders who previously received complaints, to verify if they are wearing a mask with a selfie. | Uber
Curbside pickup is a lifeline for eateries. How long can it last? NACTO estimates 100 cities have created curbside pickup zones. | Pew Trusts
Mapping the global ridepooling market. “As of September 2020, more than 330 On-Demand Ridepooling projects have been initiated around the globe, of which over 200 are active today.” | Lukas Foljanty
An interesting thread on Chinese food delivery app algorithms: “Apparently the delivery platforms ask drivers to follow *walking* rather than driving directions, so drivers have no choice but to go against the traffic, run red lights, etc.” | Yiqin Fu
Uber launches car rentals in the UK through a partnership with CarTrawler. | The Verge

Investment & Deals

The Pro’s Closet, a used bike marketplace app, raised a $12 million Series A to expand its business in the USA. | Crunchbase

We would love to hear your thoughts. Give feedback.