Scooterson is issuing a SAFE with a valuation cap of $19 million and no conversion discount. That valuation is high, especially given that the firm has no revenue yet. The lack of a conversion discount makes it even less appealing for investors. Thus, Scooterson’s price score is its lowest across all five metrics.

Broadly speaking, the market for micromobility is large and growing. According to a report by McKinsey & Company, the industry should be worth between $330 billion and $500 billion by 2030. Most of that opportunity — between $200 billion and $300 billion — resides in the US, and another $100 billion to $150 billion resides in Europe. China’s market should be worth between $30 billion and $50 billion, but this is a bit deceptive. The market here is being valued by dollars, not activity. Even by 2030, the pricing for rides in the space will be just 20% of what we see in the US. That means that the activity in the space for China will be between the high end of what we will see in Europe and the mid-point of what we will see in the US. 

Though the micromobility market is significant in size, the eScooter market is considered much smaller. One source we found pegs the opportunity today at about $20 billion. With an annualized growth rate of 7.7%, it expects for the opportunity to grow to $42 billion by 2030. Another source suggests a similar growth rate of 6.5% per annum, but its forecast is for the market to grow to just $22.1 billion by 2025. No matter how you stack it, the niche’s growth rate is fairly attractive, even if the market is not particularly large. Due to this, the market score for Scooterson is middle of the road. 

At present, there are two key individuals heading the Scooterson team. The first of these is co-founder and CEO Mihnea Chis. Prior to starting the company, Chis served as a Director and Producer in the film industry. Before that, he worked for a company called KopterX as a Custom Drones Designer/Builder. This kind of technical experience — he focused on things like the company’s anti-vibration damping system — is great to see in a founder. This is even if that past work is not at all related to what Chis is doing today. Before working at KopterX, he was employed as a Producer and Film Director at 7G, and before that he was a Creative Director for Sevengee. This last role gave him experience in digital marketing and social media campaigns. That should prove very relevant for Scooterson today.

The other key employee at Scooterson today is Deepansh Jain, Scooterson co-founder and CTO. Before Scooterson, Jain founded and ran Hacktor. That entity operated as a software company that would hack and replace outdated software for clients. Before that, he was the co-founder of Signals Inc., which offered development work for its clients. He also worked as the co-founder of the Shifu app, which reminded users about tasks they needed to complete. All of these activities make him a solid CTO for a firm like Scooterson, admittedly with an emphasis on the software side more than on the hardware side. 

Due to the wide-ranging technical experience and prior startup endeavors of Scooterson’s co-founders, the company rated above average for its team score.

One of the strongest areas for Scooterson involves its key differentiators. The company’s intelligent technology, for starters, puts it worlds apart from the other services that exist today. Companies like Phat Scooters, Skooza, and Scrooser lack essentially all of the software-based features that Scooterson boasts. They are also hundreds of dollars more for the units that would be comparable in build to Scooterson’s Rolley model. In short, what differentiates Scooterson from its rivals is the following: the firm offers a quality product at a low cost that has a range of value-added software features built into it. Additionally, the company has already secured multiple patents for its technology, with three more pending. Scooterson has succeeded in setting its product apart, despite strong competition in the eScooter sector. Thus, the company’s differentiators score is its highest across all five metrics. 

Performance can be a tricky thing to judge for a startup. If it were based solely on revenue and profit, Scooterson would doubtlessly score low on our system. After all, in both 2018 and 2019 the company generated nothing in the way of sales. In 2018, the firm lost $919,672 and saw cash outflows of $991,389. In 2019, the picture wasn’t much different, with a net loss of $954,059 and cash outflows of $823,148. However, there are other ways in which the firm has done well. Most significant is that, between July and October 2020, the business locked in pre-sales exceeding $1.1 million. That’s a lot in a very short period of time. The firm is projecting revenue of $25 million by the end of 2021, but investors should take this forecast (or any forecast) with a grain of salt. Scooterson has also won various awards such as the Red Dot Award and was named as a finalist for both the LA New Mobility Challenge and the HowToWeb’s Startup Spotlight awards. Balancing its lack of revenue against what looks to be strong growth in 2020, Scooterson’s performance score is middling.

On the bearish side of the equation, there are some things investors should be worried about. The fact that the business has yet to generate revenue and is seeing significant net losses and cash outflows is discouraging. The market opportunity is decent, but it’s also rapidly becoming crowded. In addition to this, the team is about average, and the valuation being asked by management is awfully high. Any one of these issues could come back to hurt investors to some degree.

Although there are bearish issues associated with Scooterson, there are bullish ones as well. For starters, the industry it’s operating in is growing at a decent clip. The company’s patents and pending patents are encouraging. The pre-sales figure generated over such a short period of time is also very significant. In fact, it could be considered the most important bullish talking point for management to boast. Another big positive for the company and its investors is just how differentiated it is from the competition. That is a huge win.

Taking all of the data we have and putting it together, it becomes clear that Scooterson is an interesting business. It certainly does offer some nice upside potential. Some weaknesses do exist, which means that investors are exposed to risks moving forward. However, these risks are not so large that they more than offset the potential upside the firm offers. Because of this, Scooterson has been rated a Neutral Deal at this time.

For questions regarding the KingsCrowd staff pick or ratings for this company, please reach out to support@kingscrowd.com. 

Analysis written by Daniel Jones.