Uber will rent scooters through its app in partnership with Lime
Electric scooter rental company Lime is teaming up with Uber to bring an unconventional mode of transportation to the world.
Uber Technologies Inc. is investing in Lime as part of a $335 million financing round, the companies plan to announce on Monday. The deal, led by Alphabet Inc.’s venture arm GV, values the scooter business at $1.1 billion.
While details of the partnership are still being finalized, Uber plans to promote Lime in its mobile application and slap its logo on the scooters, executives from the two companies said. Uber took a similar step with a startup called Jump Bikes, which rents electric bicycles, before acquiring the business for more than $100 million in April. Uber said it still plans to roll out e-bikes in more cities around the world.
The Uber-Lime alliance has implications for the brewing scooter ground war. Since Lime was founded 18 months ago, the San Mateo, Calif.-based company has raised $467 million. Los Angeles-based Bird Rides has nearly as much cash. It was founded by Travis VanderZanden, a onetime Uber executive who has adopted a similar aesthetic to his former employer: In contrast to Lime’s bright color scheme and affable executives, Bird uses darker tones, and its founder is a controversial figure. Investors recently valued VanderZanden’s year-old company at $2 billion.
Lime first launched a dockless bike-share program in Aurora in October 2017, before bringing dockless scooters to Denver in May this year. The company clashed with the city of Denver, which threatened to remove scooters if Lime didn’t clear them from obstructing public sidewalks and streets. Eventually the city followed through on this threat, confiscating 250 Lime and Bird scooters. It later launched a pilot program to guide the use of dockless scooters in Denver and Lime announced it would temporarily remove its scooters from Denver’s streets while it worked to get legal.