Markus Villig, CEO, Bolt. Photo credit: Web Summit, licensed under CC BY 2.0

Bolt, the Estonian ride-hailing company, has said that it’ll invest over 100 million euros ($118 million) to launch a large shared e-scooter network in Europe, with a broader aim to be the biggest e-scooter rental service in the continent. Bolt’s bet notably comes at a time when its major business of cab services have been severely hit by the coronavirus pandemic.

Under its expansion plan, Bolt says it aims to bring over 130,000 scooters to more than 100 European cities next year. The company already has a fairly large e-scooter business across some countries in Europe but now seems to have its eyes set on rapid expansion.

Bolt first introduced a shared e-scooter service in 2018. Ironically, Bolt was formerly known as Taxify while the name ‘Bolt’ was given to the company’s e-scooter service. The Estonian company later rebranded from ‘Taxify’ to ‘Bolt’ in early 2019 in line with its plan of expanding from just taxi services to multiple transportation options. 

Bolt is a well-funded startup, backed by $410 million in equity and debt funding from a group of investors including German automaker Daimler, Chinese ride-hailing company Didi Chuxing, and G Squared. The company’s most recent funding round placed its valuation at $1.9 billion. 

Related;

• Tier Scores $250M Round

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