RSG118: Michal Naka on the State of Mobility in 2022

If you don’t know Michal Naka, you will after this episode! Michal is an expert in mobility, and I actually consider him ‘The Scooter Guy’ in comparison to The Rideshare Guy. If you really want to learn more about mobility and scooters, you won’t want to miss this episode.

If you’d like to read a transcript of this podcast, please click here.

Intro

  • Today I’m chatting with Michal Naka
  • Speciality is mobility and scooters
  • We’ll be talking about mobility, scooters, car-share, and more today
  • 2020 – the year of regulation? We’ll talk about it, and global mobility too!

Intro to Michal Naka

  • Leads Partner Products at Ride Report
  • Works with mobility providers and cities around the world
  • Writes the newsletter Movements (sign up below) – focuses on mobility, infrastructure, software
  • Saw a market and interest from people in the mobility, scooter space

What Will 2020 and Beyond Bring to Mobility?

  • Micromobility is going to be big in 2020 and beyond – electric bikes
  • Divestment of large automakers from sharing services
  • Significant spending in hardware, research and development in the micromobility space

Global Mobility

  • Interesting auto manufacturers starting at the local end of the market and working up
  • Didi is working on purpose-built hardware
  • Electric cars – might not be the perfect rideshare vehicle, but it’s the beginning
  • Trends might have started in the US, but now moving globally

Entrepreneurs + Micromobility

  • If you’re a company or entrepreneur interested in mobility, might want to focus on going global
  • India is another huge market – high population, huge interest
  • Bounce Share out of Bangalore – crossed 100k trips per day with mopeds!
  • Need more entrepreneurs – not more regulation

2020: Year of Regulation?

  • Rideshare specifically, too much of a good thing can be bad
  • Regulation is important and need to empower cities
  • Can inhibit entrepreneurs and make it harder to get off the ground

Food Delivery

  • Where does food delivery fit in with mobility
  • Different models – stand alone delivery companies like Postmates, DoorDash, etc.
  • Uber Eats – same thing but built into other mobility stacks
  • Cloud kitchens – they’re their own category but could aggregate with other food delivery services

Outro

  • Thanks to Michal for coming on this episode and sharing his thoughts about mobility in 2020
  • I think Michal was the perfect guest for this episode given his knowledge – he’s definitely going to have to come back on this podcast!

Show Notes