Ford is buying dockless electric scooter startup Spin, Axios reports. According to a source, “the total consideration in the deal was close to $100m.” Previous reports had put the sale at around $40 million.
“If you look at the data, the customer has spoken, in the U.S. alone, there are 240,000 trips happening on scooters daily, generating $1 million in revenue every day,” said Marcy Klevorn, president of mobility at Ford.
The startup, Spin, has scooters in Coral Gables, FL; Washington D.C.; Charlotte, NC; Durham, NC; Lexington, KY; Denver, CO; Detroit, MI; and Long Beach, CA. It also has scooters on five college campuses.
Spin has been in the news recently as it was one of the first three companies to launch scooters in San Francisco back in March. Along with Bird and Lime, Spin was forced to remove its scooters until the city determined the proper permitting process. Spin failed to receive a permit to operate, which has led to it being one of the more quiet scooter startups. However, next week Spin will meet with the city of San Francisco to appeal the previous permit decisions.
Previously in June, Spin had a contract with Ninebot, an electric scooter manufacturer owned by Segway. Spin was to purchase 30,000 scooters a month through the end of the year.
At this point, it is unclear why Ford wants to acquire Spin, or any electric scooter company, when it could have formed a partnership with scooter manufacturers to launch its own service. However, today’s acquisition by Ford will likely see more scooters been launched to more cities.
