Shared scooter business has continued to develop frantically because of the increasing demand for micro mobility in urban life. During this period, a large number of well-known shared mobility companies have emerged, such as Bird, Spin, Lime and so on. In addition to solving the practical problems of people’s micro mobility, shared scooters can continue to make positive contributions to environmental protection. More importantly, the continuous profits have also been greatly favored by the capital market. However, the fact is that the business of shared mobility is far from reaching market saturation, and anyone who wants to get a share of it has a great opportunity. So, how to start a shared mobility company like Bird, Spin, Lime to do the shared scooter business?
1. Choose the right electric scooter
Once you choose an electric scooter as the carrier of shared mobility business, it is particularly important to choose the right electric scooter. The quality of the product should be put in the first place, which determines the safety of riding and the cost of subsequent maintenance. Imagine that if the quality of the electric scooter is poor, let alone the hidden safety hazards during the riding process, the maintenance cost in the later period will become the largest part of the expenditure and directly lead to the loss of profits.
2. How to choose the right scooter?
Purely from the appearance and configuration, many electric scooters seem to be the same look. However, we need to focus on the aspects including:
- Structural strength – to ensure that the strength of the entire vehicle passes the test;
- Waterproof performance – In addition to the waterproof performance of the whole vehicle, the core components and the wiring and cable connectors should be not lower than IPX7;
- Batteries – removable batteries will greatly increase the convenience of maintenance. At the same time, it is necessary to ensure the stability of the battery management system to avoid dangerous events such as battery burning. Therefore, it is particularly important to choose a supplier with R&D and production experience;
- Controller – the stability of the controller must be guaranteed. This is the brain that controls many key parameters;
- IoT module – it is best to choose the IoT module produced by the same R&D and production electric scooter manufacturer. This is conducive to the stability of the product. Even if you encounter problems later, you can lock a single manufacturer to solve the problem; if you buy a third-party IoT module, in the event of a problem, IoT and scooter manufacturers will pass the buck to shirk responsibility, resulting in inefficient after-sales solutions.
Other basic parameters, such as battery capacity, cruising range, etc. are selected according to your specific needs.
3. Cost of electric scooters
A qualified shared electric scooter, according to different specifications and functions, the purchase cost is often between 400-800 US dollars. The reason why it is more expensive than ordinary consumer-grade electric scooters is that shared scooters need to be exposed to the sun every day, which has extremely high quality requirements, such as the strength of the frame material, the waterproof performance of internal parts, etc., and the shared scooters are integrated with IoT The module, thus the overall cost of design, material and production is higher than consumer-grade scooters.
4. APP and backstage server
Users need the APP to scan to ride, make payments, and return the scooter, etc. Operators need to have their own backstage management system for operation and maintenance management. Whether you have a software development team or not, this is not a very difficult step. There are many mature software platforms for reference or direct selection.
5. Rent your scooters
After everything is ready, it must be approved by the relevant local government. At this point, you can start to drop the scooter to the relevant location, so that people can enjoy the convenience of micro mobility. From our experience, the shared electric scooter business can generally be profitable in 3 months, which is not a long process.
