Former e-scooter giant files for insolvency
Bird is at the forefront of the e-scooter offensive and is quickly worth a billion dollars. Now, however, the US company is filing for bankruptcy. Business has been going from bad to worse recently, and has even been catastrophic on the stock markets.
The electric kick scooter provider Bird wants to reorganize itself in US insolvency proceedings. Operations are to continue unchanged, as Bird announced. New financing of 25 million dollars has been agreed with lenders and the US company Bird Global has filed for Chapter 11 of the US Bankruptcy Code, which offers protection from creditors' claims. The European company Bird Europe and the business in Canada are not part of the proceedings.
"We are making progress toward profitability and intend to accelerate that progress by downsizing our capital structure as part of this restructuring. We remain focused on our mission to make cities more livable by leveraging micromobility to reduce car use, traffic and carbon emissions," said interim CEO Michael Washinushi.
Bird was founded in 2017 by Travis VanderZanden, a former manager at ride-hailing company Uber. The company was a pioneer in the business idea of bringing scooters for rent to large cities and was quickly valued at more than one billion dollars. However, interest in e-scooters as a means of transportation waned. There was also criticism that the vehicles took up too much space on sidewalks. Paris banned pedal scooters in September.
Against this backdrop, Bird shares had been on a downward spiral for some time. In September, the New York Stock Exchange initiated proceedings to delist them from the stock exchange after Bird's average market capitalization fell below 15 million dollars for more than 30 consecutive days.
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Despite facing financial challenges, Bird, the e-scooter provider based in the USA, has secured new financing and initiated Chapter 11 insolvency proceedings in the US. Despite the insolvency filing, operations are set to continue as the company works towards profitability.
Source: www.ntv.de
