I was worried that these guys were selling “franchise opportunities” or “exclusive territories” to clueless schlubs, I mean, America’s entrepreneurs.
I think they’re doing the variant “Lose a ton of money until all your competitors fail then hope you can pull out of the five at the last minute and enjoy flying in a nice empty sky.”
These companies all want to be THE scooter company, but they need to burn money “building their brand” until they’re too ubiquitous to fail (or get acquired). It’s not the WORST strategy and a few companies have actually made it kinda work over the years, but it pretty much guarantees the landscape will be littered with burnouts.
A major problem is that they are getting banned in cities faster than they can be set-up. Also there are and will be shitloads of lawsuits from injuries. I don’t see this being viable for that much longer.