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Bolt CEO Markus Villig | Image credit: Bolt

Tallinn, Estonia-based Bolt, a transportation platform providing ride-hailing, micromobility and food delivery services in Europe, announced on Tuesday its plans to invest over €150M in 2022 to further scale its scooter and e-bike operations and develop solutions to enhance user experience and safety.

Bolt says it will expand its fleet to more than 230,000 scooters and e-bikes across 250+ cities by the end of this year.

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The company also reported that it has witnessed a ‘huge’ increase in the usage of its scooters compared to twelve months ago. The company reports a 500 per cent increase in rides in March, 2022, compared to the same time last year.

Bolt’s recent growth and development

According to the company, its increase in scooter rides is a result of rapid expansion into new cities and countries. Bolt now has scooters in more than 170 European cities across 20 countries, up from around 60 cities in 15 countries twelve months ago. This includes expansion in Germany, where Bolt scooters are present in 54 cities, with Berlin, Hamburg, Cologne, Düsseldorf and Frankfurt to name a few.

The company intends to operate its e-bike and scooter fleets in more than 250 cities across Europe by the end of 2022. Bolt confirmed its plans for 2022 growth by obtaining licences to operate scooters in such cities as Oslo (Norway), Rijeka (Croatia), Turin (Italy), and Gothenburg (Sweden) this year.

Dimitri Pivovarov, VP Rentals at Bolt, says, “Our mission is to help build cities for people, not cars, by providing more affordable and environmentally friendly shared mobility alternatives for all city trips. Scooters and e-bikes are a perfect alternative to cars for shorter inner-city trips, so it’s encouraging to see the customer demand for our scooters as we continue to expand across Europe.”

Earlier this year, Bolt conducted a research with Norway’s Institute of Transport Economics (Transportøkonomisk institutt, TØI) and found that in-app encouragement resulted in up to 60 per cent increase in users across ten European cities shifting from ride-hailing to scooters for shorter trips, highlighting the potential to improve air quality in cities.

Bolt’s fifth-generation electric scooter, Bolt 5, is currently being rolled out in cities across Europe and is designed to meet the needs of customers and cities by providing the highest standards of safety, sustainability and comfort.

Affordable and sustainable mobility

Bolt was founded in 2013 by Markus Villig, Martin Villig, and Oliver Leisalu. Previously known as Taxify, Bolt is a transportation platform that provides ride-hailing, micromobility, package delivery, and scooter-sharing services. The company aims to make urban travel easier, quicker, and more reliable.

Currently, Bolt has 100 million customers in 45 countries and over 400 cities across Europe and Africa. The mobility platform claims that all its rides in Europe are 100 per cent carbon-neutral as part of its Green Plan, a long-term commitment to reduce the ecological footprint of the company.

In December, 2021, Bolt announced a range of new safety features for its scooter-sharing network to demonstrate how the company is a reliable partner for cities. These features include a tandem riding prevention system, which can detect more than one person riding a scooter at the same time; a cognitive reaction test to ensure riders stay as safe as possible; and a skid prevention system meaning scooters are only used in a safe and responsible manner.

Scooter-sharing is just one part of Bolt’s suite of mobility and delivery products. The company’s other products include its ride-hailing service, car-sharing service Bolt Drive, Bolt Food, which enables customers to order meals from restaurants, and Bolt Market, a 15-minute grocery delivery service.