The economics of scooter rentals.

[e-beach]

If the charger is 42v, that's a "36v" battery pack. (10s Li-Ion/etc)

42v at what amps. Looking for reliable information on the watt draw to calculate cost of charging. Around here it is about 18¢ per kilowatt hour. Other locations will very.

 

[amberwolf]

Ah, well, your question as posted was what *voltage* the scooters were.

The questions you would really need answered are

"how many Ah is the pack?" (or rather, how many Wh, to get an accurate number)

and

"how efficient is the charger?"

so that the kWh usage could be calculated for charging. (Wh / efficiency)


Another question to ask might be

"how many amps does the charger take at full charging current?"

which could help determine where you could plug it in, and how many of them you could charge at once from a single outlet / source of a certain capability.

 

[e-beach]

Ah, well, your question as posted was what *voltage* the scooters were.

The questions you would really need answered are

"how many Ah is the pack?" (or rather, how many Wh, to get an accurate number)

and

"how efficient is the charger?"

so that the kWh usage could be calculated for charging. (Wh / efficiency)


Another question to ask might be

"how many amps does the charger take at full charging current?"

which could help determine where you could plug it in, and how many of them you could charge at once from a single outlet / source of a certain capability.

Exactlly.......which leads to the conclusion I was hoping to avoid which of course is..."Dang!!! Now I got to do it to really find out!" It is kind of what I was thinking anyway.

Looks like I might just have to pull out the old home-built e-bike trailer and go collect some of these things that are scattered all over my town.:lol:

 

[amberwolf]

Just keep in mind they aren't going to have their chargers with them...so whatever you charge them with may have different efficiency (and charge rate) which may affect the actual power usage results. Probably not by much, but...there you go.

 

[wire.rat]

I just welded a bike trailer together using 2 inch x 1inch x 0.1 inch thick steel tubes

 

[amberwolf]

To continue the OT about trailers:
https://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=94215&hilit=trailer#p1387398

(yes, that's a piano)

 

[e-beach]

It is a nice design for sure. I like the way it is low.

However something was amiss last night. I went to the market just about sunset and the Bird scooters that for months had been littering the neighborhoods were all gone? They were even gone on the busy boulevard? I am wondering if the lawsuit put a fear of more law suits into Bird? Something made the change happen.

 

[e-beach]

Another lawsuit......

https://theblast.com/bird-scooters-lawsuit-paraplegic/

A woman in Los Angeles is suing the scooter company Bird and the cities of Beverly Hills, Santa Monica and Los Angeles claiming the massive influx of scooters in the city has made life miserable for disabled people like her.

Mia Labowitz lives in West Los Angeles and is a paraplegic. She says she is unable to walk or stand and relies on a wheelchair for mobility. Labowitz says she has been issued a Disabled Person Parking Placard by the State of California and uses a specially equipped car.

According to court documents obtained by The Blast, Labowitz claims Bird and the cities involved have used and exploited the curb ramps, sidewalks, crosswalks, pedestrian crossings and other walkways within the cities of Santa Monica, Los Angeles and Beverly Hills “for their own corporate profit to the harm of some of the most vulnerable residents of the Cities, the disabled.”

Labowitz notes that when scooter riders have completed their trip, they abandon it “near their destination, typically on public property in a Pedestrian Right of Way. The Electric Scooters are sometimes parked upright. They are also left laying on their side, blocking paths of travel along the length of the scooter. Multiple Electric Scooters are also frequently abandoned together in groups.”

She claims the high speed of the scooters when they are in use — coupled with the fact the riders are not required to undergo any training to use them — “creates hazardous conditions which causes Named Plaintiff, and likely others in the Proposed Class difficulty, humiliation and frustration. Named Plaintiff does not want to be hit or run over by one of the Electric Scooters.”

Labowitz says in the past few months, she has encountered scooters “parked on and blocking Pedestrian Rights of Way or being driven on Pedestrian Rights of Way in the Cities, denying her full and equal access to the Pedestrian Rights of Way and causing her difficulty, frustration and embarrassment, and placing her in danger of injury or death. She continues to be deterred from leaving her home, since the invasion of these Electric Scooters on the streets of the Cities.”

She is suing claiming the scooters are operating in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act and is seeking an order barring the scooters from blocking and operating on the various pedestrian rights of way.

Labowitz is also seeking unspecified damages.

The Blast reached out to Bird for comment — so far, no word back.

 

[e-beach]

So here is the low-down this weekend. Bird, Lime and other scooters are still in Santa Monica where they have an agreement. Bird has mostly disappeared from West Los Angeles as they have no agreement with Los Angeles. A few lime scooters are still around. However Jump dockless bikes are suddenly all over West Los Angeles. Looks like they see an opertunity. :wink:

 

[e-beach]

Yes, permits required. At least eventually.

By Annlee Ellingson – Staff Writer, L.A. Biz
Nov 14, 2018, 9:00am

The streets of Los Angeles may be littered with scooters from Bird and Lime, but it’s Uber-owned Jump that secured the first permit to operate the shared electric vehicles in the city.

The company, which first launched its e-scooters in Santa Monica last month, has started rolling out 3,000 dockless e-bikes and e-scooters elsewhere in Los Angeles, starting with West L.A.

“We’ve seen great success with our bikes and scooters in Santa Monica, so L.A. was a natural next location for us to expand into,” said Megan Prichard, Jump’s general manager for Southern California. “Given Los Angeles notoriously has one of the worst congestion problems in the world, adding a mixture of e-bikes and scooters will offer affordable, environmentally friendly ways to get from point A to point B.”

That doesn’t mean Angelenos won’t be able to rent — or stumble over — Bird or Lime scooters. The L.A. City Council unanimously approved a one-year pilot program in September with the expectation that permitting would take as long as four months. In the meantime, scooter companies can deploy up to 3,000 vehicles.

"Jump’s electric bikes and scooters will open up mobility options to thousands of new riders on the Westside and beyond, providing another great alternative to driving,” added L.A. City Councilman Mike Bonin.

L.A.’s scooter pilot aims to promote safe use and considerate parking of the vehicles, as well as encourage their deployment in low-income areas and accessibility to disabled and non-English-speaking users.

 

[e-beach]

https://qz.com/1325064/scooters-might-actually-have-good-unit-economics/
Ship..........
What are the unit economics of scooters? Here is some quick math on Bird, the original scooter unicorn:

In Santa Monica, Bird’s first city, the average Bird scooter does 5-6 trips per day, Bird disclosed at a June city council meeting.
The average length of a Bird trip is 1.6 miles (same city council meeting).
Bird charges $1 per trip plus $0.15 per minute.
Assuming an average speed of 7.5 miles per hour, the average trip lasts 12.8 minutes.
In which case the average trip costs $2.92.
At 5.5 trips per day, the average scooter earns about $16 a day.

Not bad, right? The Xiaomi scooter that Bird uses sells for about $500 on Amazon but $320 (1,999 yuan) in China. We don’t know what Bird pays for a scooter, but, if we assume Bird is paying the China price or less because of a bulk deal, it would recoup the initial capital cost in 20 days. If we assume the Amazon price (unlikely as Bird has a contract with Xiaomi), then the scooter would recoup its overhead in just over a month.

The real question is what a scooter costs to service and maintain. We know that Bird hires basically anyone to charge its scooters overnight and redeploy them in the morning, usually for $5 per scooter, but sometimes for more. A typical charge takes 3-5 hours, and by farming this out to eager contractors, Bird conveniently avoids the electric bill. That brings our scooter revenue per day down to $11.......snip

 

[neptronix]

Oh interesting, someone else did the math.
I found some of these for $200 on alibaba. Surely the real price is ~$250ish.

I did not know about the $1 per ride fee. That makes my calculations look better as a business case.
Of course, what taxes and regulations government will impose is always a wildcard..

 

[Hillhater]

Do these scooters/Ebikes have the same requirement for users to register with the company..AND pay a deposit ? ..which is the way the "sharebike" schemes operate here.
$60 deposit before you get the access code to unlock and ride one.
So $600,000 for every 10,000 users . Easy money in a big city of millions
they really do not care too much about the operating income or profit margin, they have your deposit in their account ( probably in China !, so kiss that goodby !)..
When some of those companies got shut down here, they just walked away and left thousands of bikes on the streets..actually told registered members to keep them in leu of returned deposits.
also for IT/tracking hardware and software,..remember that has all been previously done and tested for those share bikes, so minimal on cost there ($10 per unit ?)
This is nothing to do with public transport solutions,..its just a very smart modern financial scheme. A financial "hit & Run" ....about as ethical as those "pyramid sales" schemes of the 70/80's !

 

[alan]

"Your fleet of 50 is producing $81,000 per month in fares.
OK, so you need to hire a guy to maintain the scooters. 1 guy working full time could probably handle them all.
There goes $30,000, leaving you with $51,000 a month."

Correcting the $30K employee to the closer to $60K you later use, I believe you are still confusing $60K/year with $81K/month. The $60K/year is $5K/month, leaving gross profit after employee at $81K - $5K = $76K/month, not $51K/month.

 

[neptronix]

Oops, a little dyslexia there in the calculations.

Thanks for noticing.

 

[Chalo]

https://www.theverge.com/platform/amp/2018/12/16/18141418/scooter-vandalism-rugged-bird-lime-spin-acton

Bird said it provided 170,000 rides per week in the first week of May. The company had around 10,500 “active” scooters during that period, and each one was used five times per day. Active scooters generate $3.65 in revenue per ride, the company said. Meanwhile, Bird spent $1.72 per ride on charging costs, and another $0.51 per ride, on average, on repairs. That doesn’t include credit card fees, permit fees, insurance, customer support, and other costs. So in May, Bird was pulling in about $602,500 in weekly revenue, offset by $86,700 in maintenance costs. That means Bird was eking out $0.70 in profit per ride, or a 19 percent gross profit margin.

That kind of margin won't withstand foreseeable developments like people learning to harvest the batteries and sell the metals for scrap.

 

[Hillhater]

https://www.theverge.com/platform/amp/2 ... spin-acton
Bird said it provided 170,000 rides per week in the first week of May. The company had around 10,500 “active” scooters during that period, and each one was used five times per day. Active scooters generate $3.65 in revenue per ride, the company said. Meanwhile, Bird spent $1.72 per ride on charging costs, and another $0.51 per ride, on average, on repairs. That doesn’t include credit card fees, permit fees, insurance, customer support, and other costs. So in May, Bird was pulling in about $602,500 in weekly revenue, offset by $86,700 in maintenance costs. That means Bird was eking out $0.70 in profit per ride, or a 19 percent gross profit margin.

The maths doesn add up..
$3.65 per ride
$1.72 per ride for charging ( ??)
$0.51 per ride for maintenance $repairs
So, ..Income per ride = $3.65
Costs per ride =. $2.23
Margin per ride. =. $1.42
$1.42/$3.65. = 40% margin
But....if each ride is 1.6 miles, ..why does it cost $1.72 to recharge ? (Approx $9.0 /day /scooter!)

 

[e-beach]

It might be the "hoarding" that goes on that is driving the cost of charging seeming high. (Hoarding: collecting bird scooters and hiding them someplace until the rate to charge them goes up to $20.00 per scooter.)

 

[wturber]

I doubt we'll be seeing htem in Phoenix anytime soon; they're illegal here on any public path/sidewalk/street/etc. (because of the number of accidents, injuries, etc. some years back from them when Razor started selling theirs, I think it was). The police do enforce it sometimes, but I don't see many people riding them, other than little kids right around their homes in their neighborhoods.

I don't know if surrounding cities also forbid them; PHoenix does it under the "toy" definition, since they don't match the definition of any other "vehicle" or wheel transport, they make them match that one, and exclude "toys" from the roads and paths/etc.

Saw two young men on one on 15th Ave between Bethany Home and Camelback scooting along in the bike lane at about 7:20PM. Yep. Two on one scooter standing back to back. They are now all over the place in the Scottsdale Airpark area. They seem to have replaced the dockless pedal bikes that seem to be suddenly rare. I've actually seen more people using the scooters than the bikes. But usage still seems pretty low.

 

[wturber]

https://www.theverge.com/platform/amp/2 ... spin-acton
Bird said it provided 170,000 rides per week in the first week of May. The company had around 10,500 “active” scooters during that period, and each one was used five times per day. Active scooters generate $3.65 in revenue per ride, the company said. Meanwhile, Bird spent $1.72 per ride on charging costs, and another $0.51 per ride, on average, on repairs. That doesn’t include credit card fees, permit fees, insurance, customer support, and other costs. So in May, Bird was pulling in about $602,500 in weekly revenue, offset by $86,700 in maintenance costs. That means Bird was eking out $0.70 in profit per ride, or a 19 percent gross profit margin.

The maths doesn add up..
$3.65 per ride
$1.72 per ride for charging ( ??)
$0.51 per ride for maintenance $repairs
So, ..Income per ride = $3.65
Costs per ride =. $2.23
Margin per ride. =. $1.42
$1.42/$3.65. = 40% margin
But....if each ride is 1.6 miles, ..why does it cost $1.72 to recharge ? (Approx $9.0 /day /scooter!)

Right. But the margin per ride doesn't include any of the other costs such as the cost of the scooters, insurance, license fees, marketing etc. It may be that the calculation includes that but those important bits were either omitted or edited out in the article.

 

[wturber]

I ran across someone on Craigslist who sez he has ordered 200 circuit board that will convert a particular brand of rental scooter into a non-GPS tracked and fully functional one. Of course he warns you only to modify a scooter that you've acquired legally. The circuit board sells for $35. It will be interesting to see what kind of theft problem these scooter companies end up with.

On a positive note for the scooter companies, I was driving through downtown Scottsdale today and people are riding rental electric scooters all over the place. Less positive, I saw one guy cross a street directly in front of a car when the car had a green light and the scooter had a Don't Walk signal.

 

[e-beach]

.... The circuit board sells for $35. ...

Funny (not funny ha ha) how people will consider stealing something and hacking it when for $100 more they can purchase a scooter.

BTW, I saw this the other day. Some moving company was using these lime scooters as door stops... :lol:

 

[LockH]

Ahem... I'm about to jump into the electric bike rental biz... does "scooter rentals" include "bike-sized"? So far, have a bike store manager and staff "in place" at a prime "tourist" lending location versus scattered all over town. BUT to date they have been only retro/antique/vintage/etc pedal-only poop-mobile style bikes. And I think the bike store owner that's renting these things might be "missing the boat" in rentals to some NA folks/tourists/etc who might wish to be a little lazier (hehe) especially on some "hot" summer daze... The guy is about to go into Year Three of a five year contract with this cities Parks Department (did I mention "prime location"?) And I'm about to start feeding him electric bikes to rent. And after a "season" of "successful" rentals, and after he has paid for all his overheads like staff and location rental fee, etc, etc. and paid all taxes and taken some "healthy" profit for himself/his rentals... that he might sent me some small cheque as my own "ROI" (investor "return on investment"). So this one lazy investor (me) plans to go Piracy 101. (Others do all the work, and the captain shares the profits with crew.)

Anyway... "scooter" versus "bicycle" subject aside... No mention here yet of "seasonality" of any "seasonal" business? Or the aspect of having locations where the customer rents from (and returns to)?

BTW. Maybe only a small ROI for this one small investor... but multiply by multiple locations in different towns and locations. Hundreds and thousands of electric bikes.

Sorry again if this thread is only about distributed "scooter" rentals.

 

[wturber]

.... The circuit board sells for $35. ...

Funny (not funny ha ha) how people will consider stealing something and hacking it when for $100 more they can purchase a scooter.

The model in question is $200 and more via Alibaba - that doesn't account for shipping. NewEgg and Frys sell it at a price closer to $400.

The "hack" appears to be little more than opening up a case and replacing a circuit board.

 

[e-beach]

.... The circuit board sells for $35. ...

Funny (not funny ha ha) how people will consider stealing something and hacking it when for $100 more they can purchase a scooter.

The model in question is $200 and more via Alibaba - that doesn't account for shipping. NewEgg and Frys sell it at a price closer to $400.

The "hack" appears to be little more than opening up a case and replacing a circuit board.

And get arrested for it too! :wink: