The Station - Uber's lingering interest in micromobility, Waymo rolls out driverless and more from TC Sessions: Mobility

Saturday, October 10, 2020 • By Kirsten Korosec

Hey there! Welcome back to The Station, a newsletter dedicated to all the present and future ways people and packages move from Point A to Point B.

My week was dominated by TC Sessions: Mobility 2020, which means, yup, no more promotions from me. Hooray! The event was illuminating thanks to some candid conversations about automated vehicle technology, shared micromobility and electrification. I’ve included some of those insights below.

One housekeeping note: I’m taking a bit of time off and won’t be answering emails for the next week. The newsletter will remain however, so see ya next week. Vamos.

Email me anytime at kirsten.korosec@techcrunch.com to share thoughts, criticisms, offer up opinions or tips. You can also send a direct message to me at Twitter — @kirstenkorosec.

Micromobbin'

Uber made headlines earlier this year when it offloaded Jump, the shared bike and scooter unit that once appeared to be a critical piece of its transportation. The assumption, based on its dumping of Jump, would be that Uber was done with micromobility. That doesn’t seem to be the case, at least according to comments made by Uber Director of Policy, Cities and Transportation Shin-pei Tsay during TC Sessions: Mobility 2020.

Uber still sees micromobility as “really important” to the company, Tsay said. Here’s the important nugget:

It was really hard to let go of Jump, but micromobility is a business where on the ground operations are so important. They’re vital to the success of the operations, they’re vital to the business being able to provide the service to as many people as possible. And scaling it was, is challenging for every micromobility operator. The current state of policies around micromobility is a very challenged environment. I would say where cities are really trying to get a handle on how best to manage operators and how best to manage the public right of way.

Even though Uber offloaded JUMP to Lime, Uber is still partnering with other micromobility operators through the world. Part of that, Tsay says, means Uber can offer micromobility in more cities.

Lime made what one co-worker described to me as a “not not interesting move.” It’s one of those seemingly small news items that is signaling — at least to me — bigger moves ahead. The company is known for its bright green micromobility devices as well as the iconic red Jump electric bikes that it now owns. Lime is now expanding in a way that could see it “housing” numerous other micromobility brands on its own app.

The Lime app, which is used by customers to find and rent its bikes and scooters, will start to include Wheels -branded electric bikes in certain cities. This winter, when a user in Austin, Berlin, Miami or Seattle opens the Lime app, nearby Wheels vehicles will automatically populate the map along with pricing information. Customers can then use the Lime app to rent a Wheels e-bike.

This appears to be just the beginning. Lime plans to add more cities and companies to its revamped app soon.

The key to micromobility becoming more mainstream in Africa is infrastructure, according to Gura Ride founder Tony Adesina, who joined Voi CEO Fredrik Hjelm and Ben Bear of Spin on the TC Sessions: Mobility 2020 stage this past week. The three speakers covered a lot of ground during the panel, including the role that infrastructure plays in building a viable micromobility market.

In short: infrastructure can make or break the industry.

Micromobility is thriving so much in Europe because of the infrastructure, Hjelm said. While Adesina noted the issue of narrow roads in Rwanda, where Gura Ride operates. “How do you share the road so you don’t have a lot of hit and runs?” he mused.

Meanwhile, Hjelm said Europe’s infrastructure and its bike and moped-focused cultural makes the continent the “world’s most attractive market.”

Investing in mobility

We’re mixing up the traditional deal-of-the-week format I typically have in this spot. Investing in mobility was a key topic at TC Sessions: Mobility with an entire panel and Q&A session dedicated to the topic. (Of course, it popped up throughout the event as well). Reilly Brennan of Trucks VC, Olaf Sakkers of Maniv Mobility and Amy Gu of Hemi Ventures weighed in. Here are some of their key takeaways. (Edited for brevity and clarity)

Brennan on the evolution of micromobility:

“In the last six months, but even before COVID hit, people who were heavy users of micromobility actually fell off those platforms, not because they didn’t like bikes and scooters, because they liked them so much that they wanted to buy them. And so I think one of the things we’ll get to in micromobility is all the ways that you think about how a typical car dealership is making money or a car manufacturer making money — like with financing and maintenance and service — those pieces are going to come to micromobility. Right now, there’s actually not too much of a secondary market for used vehicles and ebikes, and scooters. One because they’re harder to get. So it’s a little bit hard to do a lot of the things that the car industry has done.

But Ridepanda and a few other companies that we’ve looked at are probably going to make the ecosystem a lot stronger. It’s just another evolution of where micromobility is heading. It’s not just about Bird and Lime and shared-use models.”

Gu on the intersection of healthcare and mobility:

“One thing that COVID has changed a lot is on the healthcare side; healthcare has become extremely important, but also as it relates to mobility — how can make we make healthcare more mobile?

I think the whole healthcare space changed because of that [COVID]. And for us as mobility investors it’s how to think about investing in the companies or startups that can meet the real need of customers right now; that becomes the priority.

“We’re looking at healthcare (investments) — about how to move healthcare around and then bringing to people’s doorsteps. I think it’s definitely important and needed and will become something I think people use to even after the COVID pandemic.”

Sakkers on U.S.-China relations and mobility:

“I think structural tensions between China and America are going to get worse. And I think you’re seeing lots of things bifurcating, and the fight is mostly around silicon right now. That’s where China is relatively weak compared to other technology areas because there’s a lot of very hard to replicate complexity around silicon and that’s why you’re seeing the fight being centered around access to silicon technologies.

I don’t think this is just a Trump policy; I think the divisions between U.S. and China are hard to get around and when it comes to mobility you kind of get two ecosystems forming. And there’s obviously some overlap. I think Tesla has been the most successful company in bridging that gap. And then there’s some Chinese EV companies that are looking to export and I think hardware like that, can straddle this gap. But you’re seeing other companies that I think are building much more to the domestic market — the most obvious example being autonomous vehicles with Baidu has an ecosystem they’re setting up in China; they don’t look so much to the U.S. market, whereas Waymo, I don’t think is really targeting China in the long run.

There’s a lot more to say about autonomous vehicles besides that, but it’s seen as more strategic and I don’t think those two things will be bridged.”

Check out more coverage of Brennan, Gu and Sakkers’ panel here:

Top VC mobility investors on the risks and rewards in partnering with giants like Amazon

Transportation VC suggest frayed U.S.-China ties will impact mobility markets

And yep, I’ve included a short dealmaking wrap up for the week:

Envisics, which combines computer vision, machine learning, big data analytics and navigation to build hardware that integrates into vehicles to project holographic, head-up displays for drivers, raised $50 million in a Series B round of funding.

GrubMarket, which provides a B2C platform for consumers to order food and home items for delivery as well as a B2B service where it supplies grocery stores, meal-kit companies and other food tech startups with products that they resell, raised $60 million in a Series D round of funding.

Instacart raised $200 million in a new funding round featuring prior investors. D1 Capital and Valiant Peregrine Fund led the investment. Instacart is now worth $17.7 billion, post-money, or $17.5 billion pre-money.

It's electric

Electrification dominated the TC Sessions: Mobility 2020 event. Lucid Motors CEO and CTO Peter Rawlinson, Polestar CEO Thomas Ingenlath, Redwood Materials co-founder and CEO JB Straubel and Celina Mikolajczak, vp of battery tech at Panasonic Energy of North America were on the virtual stage.

My interview with Straubel revealed just how big he wants his startup to be. In short: Straubel sees Redwood becoming one of, if not, the largest battery recycler in the world. During our interview, he weighed in on life at and after Tesla, the relationship with Panasonic and his ultimate ambitions.

“I want to do something that can actually make a really material impact on sustainability in the world. And you need scale to do that,” Straubel said. “So I am very excited to keep growing this and to be one of, if not the major battery recycling company in the world. And eventually, one of the large battery materials companies in the world.”

We ran out of time before Straubel could really dig into his views on second-life batteries in electric vehicles. But it’s worth noting that for those who expect Redwood and Tesla to become exclusive prepare to be disappointed.

“I think, for me, it’s pretty valuable that Redwood remains independent, and remains able to work with all of the different OEMs and also with consumer devices. “I think part of the value of us being a separate independent company is that we can provide solutions across the whole industry. And that allows us to move material, even from one industry to another. We can harvest cobalt, for instance, from consumer devices and consumer electronics, and, if you will, kind of ‘up manufacture it’ into energy storage for electric vehicles.”

Meanwhile, Ingenlath defended the range of the Polestar 2, which the EPA just certified at 233 miles.

Here’s what Ingenlath had to say:

“We know what the car does in reality. We know in reality, what might look like a very big difference, is not that much of a difference in real life. We think it’s definitely sufficient for day-to-day life as an EV. It’s one of our versions, and we will be adding different variants to the Polestar 2 that will have a higher EPA [rating]. I think [the range] is absolutely in the ballpark of competing EVs that is really good for you 365 days a year.

Ingenlath did say that longer range versions were coming.

“Next year, in 2021, we have in our plans to come out with a single motor version. This will, of course, provide a better range with the same battery. And, of course, along the way, we’ll have software improvements that will give more efficiency with the same kilowatt-hours battery.

“We are on a journey. That is where we start, and it will get better from month to month.”

Waymo rolls out driverless + other AV tidbits

Waymo announced this week that it begin to open up its driverless ride-hailing service to the public in the Phoenix area. I wrote about the whole deal here, including lots of the backstory. But for those with minimal time, here’s what you should know about this rollout.

Members of its Waymo One service will be able to take family and friends along on their fully driverless rides in the Phoenix area — no NDA required, which is for those in the company’s early rider program. Existing Waymo One members will have the first access to the driverless rides. However, the company said that in the next several weeks more people will be welcomed directly into the service through its app, which is available on Google Play and the App Store.

Waymo said that 100% of its rides will be fully driverless — which it has deemed its “rider only” mode. That 100% claim requires a bit of unpacking. The public shouldn’t expect hundreds of Waymo-branded Chrysler Pacifica minivans to suddenly inundate the entire greater Phoenix area.

Waymo has abut 600 vehicles in its fleet. About 300 to 400 of those are in the Phoenix area. Waymo wouldn’t share exact numbers of how many of these vehicles would be dedicated to driverless rides. There will be various modes operating in the Phoenix area. Some of these will be “rider only,” while other vehicles will still have trained safety operators behind the wheel. Some of the fleet will also be used for testing.

The topic of automated vehicle technology was a major theme of the TC Sessions: Mobility 2020 event. I can’t fit it all in here, so look for more of a break down of the various panels and analysis in future articles and here at The Station.

For now, I’ll highlight this response from Argo AI CEO Bryan Salesky when I asked which companies might survive this phase of consolidation that has started in the AV industry.

“I don’t have a perfect crystal ball. I’m sure no one else does, either. One of the ways I look at it is that there’s 3 trillion miles driven in the U.S. alone; hat’s not even a global statistic. And to automate even a small share of those miles is a huge undertaking. I think what we’ll start to see is sort of a standard for different types of miles, different use cases.

I think in each of those sectors, whether it be over-the-road trucking or last mile delivery, and there’s just many others … what we’re going to see is maybe one or two players that emerges in each of those areas that are putting together the right partnerships, tackling the hard technical challenges and putting together a network of customers in each of those areas.

I think that’s what’s eventually going to happen and putting a timeline on that I think is pretty difficult, but that’s where it’s going to go.”

One more AV story … Waymo and TuSimple autonomous trucking leaders on the difficulty of building a highway-safe AI

Alrighty y’all … see ya next week.