Author: Megan Rose Dickey

Posted on

Bird, Uber and Lyft get another chance to apply for electric scooter permit in SF

In light of a so-far successful electric scooter pilot program in San Francisco, the city has opened up the application process for service providers to deploy their respective scooters as part of a more permanent program. However, the permits will only be valid for about one year, “reflecting the rapid pace at which the scooter industry continues to involve,” the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency wrote on its blog.

That means starting in October 2019, we may see electric scooters from more than just Skip and Scoot. Skip and Scoot’s current permits expire on Oct. 14, 2019.

As part of the permitting program, the SFMTA plans to issue permits to “a limited number” of applicants, the agency said. The city also plans to maintain a cap on the number of scooters to be deployed at any one time, likely somewhere between 1,000 to 2,500 scooters per company. Currently, Skip is authorized to operate 800 scooters, while Scoot is authorized to operate up to 625.

The application requires companies to integrate locking mechanisms to all of its scooters, implement stricter policies to ensure people don’t ride on sidewalks as well as pilot adaptive scooters to ensure people with disabilities are not left out from this new form of transportation. This comes shortly after Lyft began testing adaptive bike share for riders in San Francisco and Oakland, Calif.

The deadline to apply is Aug. 21, 2019, which gives the likes of Bird (proud new owner of Scoot), Skip, Lime, Uber/JUMP, Lyft, Spin and the many others a fair amount of time to get their things in order. All of those companies mentioned above applied for permits to operate as part of SF’s pilot program, but were denied. Some companies took it worse than others, while others decided to focus their efforts on other markets for the time being.

What we can expect is yet another battle among the electric scooter providers to deploy their vehicles in the highly-coveted market of San Francisco.

On average, scooter riders took about 3,400 trips per day in San Francisco in May. Scoot has had a pretty drama-free existence in San Francisco, minus the whole theft and vandalism issue that forced the company to add a locking mechanism to its scooters. Skip, on the other hand, had to pull its scooters off the streets after one caught on fire in Washington, D.C.

It would be odd if the SFMTA didn’t consider that as it looks over all of the applications this time around. Meanwhile, given that a couple of Lyft’s electric bikes recently caught on fire due to apparent issues with the batteries, Lyft has likely given the SFMTA some pause around the company’s abilities to safely deploy electric vehicles.

The uncertain future of shared electric scooters

 

Posted on

Lyft pulls e-bikes in light of apparent battery fires

Lyft is pulling its e-bikes from the streets of San Francisco, as well as from those in the South Bay Area in light of two recently catching on fire. The first reported fire took place over the weekend, with the second one happening today, according to the San Francisco Examiner.

“Out of an abundance of caution, we are temporarily making the ebike fleet unavailable to riders while we investigate and update our battery technology,” a Lyft spokesperson told TechCrunch. “Thanks to our riders for their patience and we look forward to making ebikes available again soon.”

The timing couldn’t be worse for Lyft, which recently obtained the right to deploy its dockless pedal-assist bikes in the city following a lawsuit against San Francisco. But with its bikes catching on fire, it surely does not help its argument that it should be the sole provider of bike-share services in the city.

This also isn’t the first time Lyft has experienced issues with its e-bikes. In April, Lyft paused its e-bike operations in New York and San Francisco due to injuries associated with overly responsive brakes. It wasn’t until June when Lyft deployed its newly-branded e-bikes in San Jose, Calif.

It’s worth noting that Lyft is not the only micromobility service to experience apparent battery issues. Both Skip and Lime have had to pull their electric scooters in light of the vehicles catching on fire.

I’ve reached out to the SFMTA and will update this story until I hear back.

Posted on

Sex tech startups band together to protest Facebook’s ad policies

There’s a double standard when it comes to the sexualities of men versus women, trans and gender non-conforming folks. Unbound and Dame Products, two sex tech startups, have teamed up to bring attention to the issue.

By launching a website, “Approved, Not Approved” and staging a protest outside Facebook’s NYC headquarters, the two startups hope to bring more awareness to the company’s advertising guidelines that seem to favor products that cater to cisgender men. The point of the digital campaign is to show how ads for sex toys and products geared toward men are more likely to be approved than those for women, trans or gender non-conforming people.

“For so long, advertisements have been how we continue to reinforce the status quo of what we view as societally desirable and validating,” Dame Products CEO Alexandra Fine told TechCrunch. “Since we’re in a category that’s often denied, we wanted to create an experience that illuminates the disparity.”

On Facebook, for example, it’s prohibitive to promote the sale or use of adult products or services except for ads that pertain to family planning and contraception. The policy also requires that ads for contraceptives cannot focus on sexual pleasure or sexual enhancement, and have to be targeted to people 18 years or older.

“They’re never going to view sexual pleasure as necessary — only functionality as necessary,” Fine said. “And since the functioning only matters for one sex, then we’re just encouraging shitty sex or at least one-sided sex. Healthy sex should be pleasurable sex. That’s really what I think is important.”

Facebook, however, clearly disagrees since it explicitly bans ads relating to sexual pleasure.

“We have had open lines of communication with both companies about our policies and are always taking feedback,” a Facebook spokesperson told TechCrunch. “We are working to further clarify our policies in this space in the near future.”

Unfortunately, there is no telling if and when Facebook and other platforms will change their advertising policies to enable companies like Dame Products and Unbound to reach potential customers through ads.

“I think a lot of us feel like we’ve been silenced by these platforms and they control so much,” Unbound CEO Polly Rodriguez told TechCrunch. “Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest — these are the channels startups live and die by. Not being able to advertise on them is a big deal because, in addition to the policies being biased and genders, it prevents those founders from being able to reach potential customers.”

Unbound CEO Polly Rodriguez. The startup was a finalist at TC Disrupt SF Startup Battlefield finalist in 2018.

In addition to missing out on potential customers, an inability to advertise can have a detrimental effect on a business in terms of raising venture funding.

“I think one of the most frustrating things is trying to raise a round and getting pushback around where you’ll spend the money,” Rodriguez said. “It’s just tough because it’s this vicious cycle where we could be growing at the same rate as a Him or a Roman. It’s definitely in the tens of millions of dollars in terms of foregone profits.”

In addition to the protest, Fine is suing New York City’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority alleging it’s in violation of Dame’s First Amendment rights, the due process clause of the 14th Amendment and the state’s constitutional rights regarding freedom of speech. The lawsuit came in light of the MTA preventing Dame from running its ads on the subway.

Still, despite efforts to squash it, sex tech may finally be getting its moment in the sun. Earlier this month, the sex tech industry had a big win when the organizer of the Consumer Electronics Show finally decided to allow sex tech companies to exhibit and participate in its competition. That came after the Consumer Technology Association, the organizer of CES, royally messed up with sex tech company Lora DiCarlo last year. The CTA revoked an innovation award from the company, which is developing a hands-free device that uses biomimicry and robotics to help women achieve a blended orgasm by simultaneously stimulating the G-spot and the clitoris. In May, CTA re-awarded the company and apologized.

“It’s so rare you see a victory like that and it was because of the press,” Rodriguez said. “It was because it takes. It’s unfortunate these companies don’t do the right thing because it’s the right thing to do. They do the right thing when enough people speak out about it.”

Unbound makes pleasure fashionable

Posted on

CrowdLobby wants to democratize political lobbying

Lobbying, whether we like it or not, is an effective way to enact political change. But it’s historically only been available to special interest groups and corporations with hoards of cash on hand. CrowdLobby, a non-partisan organization that launched this month, hopes to change that.

Last year, corporations and special interest firms spent $3.5 billion on lobbying, according to The Center for Responsive Politics. Through CrowdLobby, the aim is to help everyday people crowdfund to hire lobbyists of their own.

“Lobbyists do have a huge effect on current legislative processes,” CrowdLobby co-founder and CEO Heidi Drauschak (pictured above on right), a lawyer with experience in the lobbying industry, told TechCrunch. “Until we can totally change the whole structure, we have to play the game. It’s not that the game is a horrible game, but it’s just that not everyone gets a chance to play.”

CrowdLobby works by featuring campaigns around issues that its community has deemed to be important. From there, anyone can contribute to the campaign — which generally seeks $50,000. The team landed on that amount after having conversations with lobbyists regarding what it would take to make a change on a state level. CrowdLobby only charges you if the campaign hits its target.

“If enough funds are raised around a specific issue, we facilitate that aggregation and the hiring of the lobbyist itself,” Drauschak said.

In order to make money, CrowdLobby charges a processing fee. The startup is still experimenting with what to charge but currently has a 25% processing fee in place. That’s undoubtedly higher than processing fees to which people are generally accustomed, but Drauschak stressed that CrowdLobby is a two-sided marketplace that facilitates the entire lobbying process. That means aggregating the funds, figuring out which lobbyist to hire and then engaging in ongoing communications with the lobbyist.

“We want to give people the exact same benefits that someone who normally hires a lobbyist would get,” Drauschak said.

CrowdLobby officially launched this month with three featured campaigns focused on education, cannabis decriminalization and autism in the state of Virginia, which is where the company is headquartered.

crowdlobby campaigns

“The community can determine if a campaign goes live,” CrowdLobby co-founder and COO Sam Biggio (pictured above on left) told TechCrunch. “We try to stay out of that process as much as possible and be the objective tool for whatever the people want.”

Currently, CrowdLobby is working with a handful of lobbyists. But the ideal number of lobbyists depends on how many campaigns CrowdLobby has going on at any given time. Right now, the goal is to build a team of lobbyists that demonstrates the credibility of the platform, Drauschak said.

CrowdLobby plans to offer campaigns in additional states by next year, at the latest, as well as get some additional campaigns off the ground. CrowdLobby does not have traditional venture funding, but raised $35,000 in a Kickstarter campaign and is currently participating in the Lighthouse Labs accelerator in Richmond, Virginia, where they received additional funding.

“Anything political is always going to be dicey,” Drauschak said. “But we’ve been setting ourselves up to take [the venture funding] route when we’re ready.”

Posted on

Uber loses Arianna Huffington and Benchmark’s Matt Cohler as board members

Uber has lost two of its board members today. Arianna Huffington, CEO at Thrive Global, and Benchmark General Partner Matt Cohler‘s resignations from the board went into effect today, according to two Uber filings with the SEC.

“Given Thrive’s growth, it has become clear to me that I will no longer be able to give my Uber board duties the attention they deserve, so I will be stepping down,” Huffington said. “It has been an unforgettable three-year ride, and I’m grateful to have been able to work alongside my fellow board members and witness the incredible work of thousands of Uber employees around the world.”

Cohler, who notified Uber of his resignation yesterday, said he and his partners “have had the privilege of being part of the Uber journey since the Series A nearly a decade ago. I’m thrilled with the company’s position, excited for the road ahead, and extend my deepest thanks to all of Uber’s past and present employees, directors, drivers, and customers.”

Benchmark, one of the largest investors in Uber, now no longer has a seat on Uber’s board of directors. It’s also worth noting that Benchmark at one point filed a lawsuit against former Uber CEO Travis Kalanick, but later dropped it.

In the filings, Uber’s independent chairperson of the board, Ron Sugar, spoke highly of both Huffington and Cohler. Regarding Huffington, Sugar said she was a “dynamic and invaluable board member.” Regarding Cohler, Sugar said Cohler and Benchmark’s “immeasurable contributions have helped make Uber the company it is today.”

Both of the filings noted that neither of their resignations was the result of any disagreements with the company or board of directors. These departures come to a couple of months after Uber’s first employee, Ryan Graves, resigned from the board of directors.

Uber closed the day trading at $43.76 per share and is currently trading at $43.60 after hours.

Posted on

Lyft poaches Bird’s head of vehicle product

Shared electric bike and scooter services are constantly at war with each other — whether it’s battling for an operating permit in a highly-coveted market, raising a massive round of funding or making a key hire. Today, the war continues with Lyft’s recent hiring of Eugene Kwak, Bird’s now-former head of vehicle product. Kwak’s first day as Lyft’s head of hardware product for bikes and scooters was this past Monday.

Bird has been on a tear as of late, between actively raising a massive D round at a $2.5 billion valuation and having been one of the first scooter startups to deploy its own custom-built scooter. The in-house scooters, previously overseen by Kwak, have proven to have a positive impact on Bird’s unit economics.

Bird has ‘positive unit economics’ with its custom scooter model, CEO says

Lyft, on the other hand, is still relying on Segway for its scooters. This hire, however, signals Lyft’s shift to deploying scooters built in house.

In addition to Kwak’s hire, Lyft has spent the last couple of months beefing up its bikes and scooters hardware team in order to keep iterating on its products. Earlier this month, Lyft also brought on Marc Fenigstein, co-founder of the now-defunct electric motorcycle company Alta Motors. Fenigstein is Lyft’s product lead for new vehicles.

Last month, Lyft brought on Mark Holveck from Tesla, where he served as a senior manager for the technology research and development team. At Lyft, Holveck is the head of hardware technology.

“We couldn’t be more excited to add these three leaders to take our hardware team to the next level,” Lyft Head of Bikes and Scooters Dor Levi said in a statement to TechCrunch. “They bring experience from some of the top hardware technology companies in the industry, and we look forward to continue offering best-in-class mobility solutions to our riders to help them easily get around their cities.”

Lyft is undoubtedly hitting its stride as a multi-modal transportation provider. To date, Lyft operates its bikes and scooters in 20 markets. Just last week, Lyft had a major legal win when a judge granted the company a preliminary injunction to prevent San Francisco from offering permits to other bike-share services.

Although Lyft is newer to the micromobility space than Bird, it’s noteworthy that the company poached a key member of one of its major competitor’s teams. Given the relative newness of this space, any little bit of a leg up on the competition will surely help.

I’ve reached out to Bird and will update this story if I hear back.

Lyft’s dockless e-bikes have made their way to SF, but it wasn’t easy

Posted on

Starbucks will soon expand its delivery service via Uber Eats

Starbucks is gearing up to bring its on-demand delivery service, in partnership with Uber Eats, throughout the nation early next year. Starbucks first partnered with Uber Eats in 2018 with a pilot in Miami and expanded to cover 11 markets.

“We are driven to create new and unique digital experiences that are meaningful, valuable and convenient for our customers,” Starbucks Group President and COO Roz Brewer said in a statement. “Partnering with Uber Eats helps us take another step towards bringing Starbucks to
customers wherever they are.”

Currently, Starbucks delivers via Uber Eats in Miami, Seattle, Boston, Chicago, New York, Washington, D.C., San Francisco, Los Angeles, Orange County, Houston and Dallas. The partnership enables customers to place orders via the Uber Eats app, and track those orders in real-time.

“Our customers are huge Starbucks fans and love being able to get their favorite items delivered with Uber Eats speed,” UberEverything VP Jason Droege said in a statement. “We’re excited to expand our partnership across the United States to make ordering their favorite coffee and breakfast sandwich as easy as requesting a ride.”

Before its partnership with Uber Eats, Starbucks partnered with Posmates to tackle the same task back in 2015. However, that relatively small test in Seattle did not turn into a long-term partnership. Just yesterday, Uber announced that it’s testing a new monthly subscription that includes unlimited free deliveries via Eats, further creeping into Postmates’ territory.

Uber tests monthly subscription that combines Eats, rides, bikes and scooters

Posted on

Bird is raising Series D round led by Sequoia at $2.5 billion valuation

Bird is raising a Series D round led by Sequoia Capital at a $2.5 billion valuation, TechCrunch has learned. Sources, however, did not indicate the size of the round.

This round follows reports from The Information that Bird was looking to raise $200 million to $300 million by the end of this summer, at a post-money valuation of more than $2.3 billion.

Bird declined to comment on the funding round, saying it does not comment on rumors or speculation.

Sequoia Capital previously led Bird’s $300 million Series C round back in June, with Roelof Botha joining Bird’s board at the time. Sequoia declined to comment on the round, but Botha did say the Bird team “exemplifies grit.”

“What they’ve accomplished in achieving both rapid growth and strong unit economics is rare for a company this complex and so early on,” Botha said in an email to TechCrunch. “Bird’s innovation across a spectrum of disciplines to achieve operational excellence at scale, including hardware design and manufacturing, vehicle maintenance and repair, optimization of Bird charging and deployment, and city-level regulatory affairs is unparalleled.”

Last week, Bird CEO Travis VanderZanden said Bird has positive unit economics on its new Bird Zero scooters, which accounts for more than 75% of its fleet. But based on one of the images VanderZanden tweeted, it seems that figure is based on a period of four weeks in the summer when scooter ridership is likely higher.

In June, Bird acquired Scoot in a deal worth less than $25 million. That acquisition marked Bird’s first expansion into traditional bicycles and mopeds. Shortly before that, Bird unveiled a two-seater hybrid bike/moped vehicle called the Bird Cruiser. In addition to offering shared vehicles, Bird is also selling scooters directly to consumers.

Prior to this round, Bird had already raised more than $400 million in funding and reached a valuation of $2 billion last June.

*An earlier version of this story said the round had closed. Bird is still finalizing the round with Sequoia.

The uncertain future of shared electric scooters

Posted on

Onward raises $1.5 million to offer round-trip rides to older adults needing assistance

Uber and Lyft aren’t designed to transport people who need a little help getting out of the house or need someone to help get them from the doctor’s waiting room back to their home. While Uber, for example, has launched Uber Health to help patients get to their appointments, the drivers are not vetted with patient assistance in mind. This is where Onward comes in.

Onward, with $1.5 million in seed funding from Royal Street Ventures, Matchstick Ventures and JPK Capital, launched a few months ago in the San Francisco Bay Area to help seniors safely get from point A to point B. Unlike Uber and Lyft, Onward offers roundtrip, door-to-door rides and aims to provide freedom for older adults who may feel isolated, Onward co-founder Mike Lewis told TechCrunch.

The idea for Onward emerged from Lewis’ experience with his mother-in-law who had Alzheimer’s. It got him and his co-founder, Nader Akhnoukh, thinking about the idea of aging in place and how older people may feel isolated as they become unable to do the tasks they’ve spent their whole lives doing, like driving.

“The minute you can’t do that, it’s sad and scary,” Lewis said.

Onward has three types of customers: older adults who are no longer able to drive, someone who can’t drive for medical reasons (surgeries, eye exams, etc.) and caregivers who are unable to provide transportation to their loved ones.

Similar to Uber and Lyft, Onward drivers are 1099 contractors but a key difference is that they are paid hourly — at least $20 per hour. Currently, there are more than 25 drivers on board who are all trained in CPR, dementia, and have gone through a background check and car inspection.

Onward also ensures its drivers know how to fold wheelchairs, though, only some drivers have the ability to transport those in powered wheelchairs. This time next year, Onward expects to have hundreds of drivers. Lewis says he also expects the number of vehicles with the ability to transport people in powered wheelchairs to increase as the company grows.

For riders, they can expect to pay $35 per hour. The minimum charge for the trip is one hour, so this is definitely geared toward people who may need the driver to wait for them during a doctor’s appointment, for example. After the first hour, Onward charges by the minute.

That hourly fee gets riders round-trip rides with the driver waiting for you at the destination, door-to-door assistance at each stop and the ability to request favorite drivers.

Onward completed its first ride in March in the San Francisco Bay Area.  For the rest of the year, Onward plans to focus on San Francisco for the rest as well as one other launch market. To date, Onward has completed more than 500 trips.

Posted on

Uber tests monthly subscription that combines Eats, rides, bikes and scooters

Uber is actively testing a monthly subscription pass that combines rides, Eats, bikes and scooters. In this pilot phase, Uber is testing a few different iterations in San Francisco and Chicago but each version includes a fixed discount on every ride, free Uber Eats delivery and free JUMP (bikes and scooters) rides. The pass costs $24.99 per month.

Uber Pass landing page for press 1In other cities, Uber is testing lower-priced passes that offer discounted rides and free delivery on Eats orders above a certain amount.

“From meals to wheels and everything in between, we’re always looking for ways to make Uber the go-to option for your everyday needs,” an Uber spokesperson said in a statement to TechCrunch.

This comes after TechCrunch first reported leaked screenshots from Uber’s Android app showing an Uber Eats pass in March, and imagined a scenario where Uber combined Eats with its Ride Pass product.

Uber first launched Ride Pass last October as a way for people to consistently pay lower prices on individual rides for a monthly fee. Lyft offers a similar monthly subscription product called All-Access.

But this is the first time Uber is combining all of its consumer offerings into one monthly subscription. A challenge in the micromobility space is product differentiation and brand loyalty, so this is a smart way for Uber to get customers to fully commit to its multi-modal platform. Imagine you’ve bought Uber’s monthly combo pass and are looking for a bike or scooter. You walk by a Lyft bike, but then open up your Uber app to see a JUMP bike isn’t all that far away. My bet is that you’d walk a bit more for that bike since you’ve already paid for it.

Meanwhile, JUMP is experiencing competition in the dockless e-bike space for the first time in San Francisco. On Friday, Lyft deployed its e-bikes that can be both docked and dockless, so it’s notable that Uber is piloting this product in SF. Uber’s combo plan also creeps into Postmates’ territory, which offers a monthly subscription product for unlimited free deliveries. As my colleague Josh Constine has previously noted, this could be a very lucrative move for Uber, as it locks customers into spending more money on Uber.