MICROMOBILITY
OPPORTUNITY KNOCKS
British micromobility brand Bo entered the market one year ago by releasing its first premium e-scooter. Daniel Blackham speaks to co-founder Oscar Morgan about the opportunities and challenges in the e-scooter market
“I
think most people in the UK in our sector very much expected [private e-scooters] to be legal by now,” said Oscar Morgan, co-founder of Bo,
when asked about how the last year has been for both the brand and the e-scooter landscape. “When I spoke to BikeBiz last year, the DfT had drafted legislation. It came up in the last parliamentary session before [former Prime Minister Boris Johnson] left, and it was due to be brought before parliament Q1 of this year. There were clearly some ‘exciting’ events in Parliament and, as a result, it’s been delayed.” With privately-owned e-scooters looking to be some way off in terms of legalisation, some brands have turned their attention to more attractive markets.
This includes cities like Paris, where private e-scooters are preferred by authorities over the now-outlawed shared transport schemes. Despite this, Bo is still invested in the UK market and sees it as a shame for the emerging industry to be missing out on opportunities. “I think the really sad thing about
www.bikebiz.com
that from a UK point of view, from a business point of view, is that it damages every part of the ecosystem,” explained Morgan.
“It means that investors are less willing to invest and it means that the companies who are going out there creating the products are also less willing to put money in.” Although the UK has been car-dominant for around the last century, Morgan believes that we are entering a new dawn when it comes to transport.
Bo CEO, Oscar Morgan
“The next 100 years is not going to be car dominant,” he said. “People are moving cities, there
are literal physical space limitations. And you can distract people with VR headsets, but the average human does not want to sit in a congestion hellscape. It’s just not the way people are.
“So the whole reason we’re getting
into this is we think that we’re entering an era of lightweight electric vehicles. And it seems to me that the lack of regulation, which is just short term political delay, is hurting the UK over a long-term new transport sector emergence.”
October 2023 | 33
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68
