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Comment by iseff | Hacker News Reader

There's almost no clearer indication that the speed of business is quickening at an amazing pace. In the scooter world, the land grab is on, and everyone is looking at ride sharing as the obvious analog, which means raise a lot of money, expand to new cities, and earn market share... quickly.

Whether a couple (or all) of these companies flame out remains to be seen, and is probably likely. But there's also likely to be a winner in this category. And the winner is likely to be worth a lot of money. These companies likely don't "deserve" their valuations based on current metrics like revenue, but the market potential is huge, the growth is high, and the capital requirements are large... so investors seem more than willing to make bets.

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This sounds exactly like the ridesharing model. Drown the market in money, kill off your competitors by undercutting on price, then jack up prices to make a business.

The problem, like ridesharing, is once you start raising prices, you just lost all of your customers to a new competitor that hasn't spent all of their money.

I don't see how this model can possibly work. The barrier to switching is almost 0 to the user - you can already see that by looking at the Uber & Lyft tags on every car you get in. Installing another app isn't as hard as swapping insurance providers or mobile platforms.

>then jack up prices to make a business

Of course this hasn't happened in the rideshare market yet - it's cheaper than ever before. I've found Uber Express prices to be almost unbelievably cheap recently.

Seems like there's at least some non-zero chance that these prices remain low until autonomous vehicles make them permanent and sustainable.

UberX prices have done nothing but increase in San Francisco for years. The minimum fare went from $5 to $7, the service fee from $1.35 to $2.20, etc.

> UberX prices have done nothing but increase in San Francisco for years

So, like everything else in SF then.

....yes

Also in the world...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inflation

>The problem, like ridesharing, is once you start raising prices

And once you start raising prices, Aima and Niu waltz in and sell scooters for a price cheaper than a single ride

Only chance I see is put cameras on them collect the visual data along with the other sensors then you have a run away data set for a set of autonomous vehicle that navigates a sidewalk.

I'm not sure this is a sign that the speed of business is really quickening all that much. VC-funded bubbles provide a local acceleration in business speed, but they also drastically increase risks and systemic waste.

It's also not clear to me that there will be "a winner" once the VC money runs out. There's no "a winner" in the convenience store market, for example. A study lists 202 viable convenience store chains, the smallest has over 30 stores. [1] And that ignores the many one-off chains, and some of the places like Walgreens and CVS that clearly substitute for convenience stores for many.

[1] http://www.cspdailynews.com/industry-news-analysis/top-conve...

That's what both Lyft and Uber thought, but instead the market has withstood two vigorous competitors, alongside strong regional competitors such as Ola, Careem, and Didi. Though margins are much higher with scooters.

I genuinely don't understand this. They can't realistically need the money, since they just raised. There's no fundamental change to their numbers or outlook in a month. There's been no obvious regulatory relaxation to take advantage of. Even if I buy the "Uber might buy us" thesis, surely it's better value for me as an existing investor to get a bigger portion of a slightly smaller check, than try to fix in an astronomical valuation by bailing more cash into the business? I really don't get the sense in this move at all.

They've gotten significantly more press outside of San Fran in the past month.

Sure, and if they manage to fix a valuation of $1.5B or even $2B, it will drive a lot more press. Are they then going to go out in July and hoover up a bunch more cash?

I understand that when a capital-intensive business sees an opportunity to grab some cash, it can make a lot of sense. There's more constraints than the scooters for them - finding the right locations, setting up bird squads, ensuring there's a kind of natural circle of travel rather than a tide of commuting. And, of course, marketing all of that at the right time. Some of that $$$ can solve, but it doesn't feel like they're at the point they can just step on the gas.

> They can't realistically need the money, since they just raised.

Keep that very same money from getting showered on a competitor? If a large chunk of money is looking for a foot on the ground in your market, opening your hands and taking it might be the only way to survive.

I wouldn't want to use a GPS tracked scooter. The company might sell my location data or get hacked. Better to buy a non-GPS tracked scooter of my own.

Better leave your phone at home while you're on a personal scooter then.

or just off its gps.

Your phone is constantly tracked by the cell towers it communicates with and in urban areas that's quite accurate location data. This data is sold to third parties.

https://krebsonsecurity.com/2018/05/tracking-firm-locationsm...

I can put my phone in a Faraday sleeve, not so easy for a scooter.

There are a number of chips in the phone running their own OSes that you have no control over.

I hate to say it but the only actual winner is the manufacturer, Xiaomi.

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