Skip to main content

Unu raises $12 million to build new electric scooter

German startup Unu raised a $12 million funding round led by Ponooc with existing investors Capnamic Ventures, Iris Capital, Michael Baum and NRW.BANK also participating. The company has been building electric scooters (the motorcycle kind) and is working on new products and services.

For the past five years, Unu has sold 10,000 scooters. The market for electric scooter is quite different depending on your country. In parts of Asia, they are massively popular and are slowly overtaking gas-powered scooters. You can see more and more electric scooters in Europe, but it’s still uncharted territories for the most part.

Unu is one of the successful European manufacturers with Govecs, BMW and others. Compared to electric cars, electric scooters present a massive advantage — weight. It’s much more energy-efficient to power a scooter compared to a full-fledged car.

That’s why batteries remain relatively small. You can open the battery compartment, pull the battery and plug it at home. It’s quite heavy as Unu’s battery weighs around 9 kg (nearly 20 pounds). But it’s fine if you just need to carry your battery to your home and plug it overnight every now and then.

Up next, the company plans to release a second generation of its product. The company doesn’t have much to say just yet. But it sounds like Unu is working on connected vehicles so that Unu could work with scooter-sharing services.

There’s a huge market opportunity as scooter-sharing companies are booming in Europe. In Paris alone, Cityscoot and Coup have flooded the streets with scooters from Govecs and Gogoro. There are many other companies working on similar services across Europe.

If Unu could convince a company to buy some of their scooters for their fleet, that could lead to thousands of sales in no time. The company is working on multiple partnerships. Now let’s see if Unu plans to create its own service in the future and work on other types of vehicles.



from TechCrunch https://ift.tt/2RhqpIK
via IFTTT
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Silent Revolution of On-Device AI: Why the Cloud Is No Longer King

Introduction For years, artificial intelligence has meant one thing: the cloud. Whether you’re asking ChatGPT a question, editing a photo with AI tools, or getting recommendations on Netflix — those decisions happen on distant servers, not your device. But that’s changing. Thanks to major advances in silicon, model compression, and memory architecture, AI is quietly migrating from giant data centres to the palm of your hand. Your phone, your laptop, your smartwatch — all are becoming AI engines in their own right. It’s a shift that redefines not just how AI works, but who controls it, how private it is, and what it can do for you. This article explores the rise of on-device AI — how it works, why it matters, and why the cloud’s days as the centre of the AI universe might be numbered. What Is On-Device AI? On-device AI refers to machine learning models that run locally on your smartphone, tablet, laptop, or edge device — without needing constant access to the cloud. In practi...
1 comment
Read more

Apple’s AI Push: Everything We Know About Apple Intelligence So Far

Apple’s WWDC 2025 confirmed what many suspected: Apple is finally making a serious leap into artificial intelligence. Dubbed “Apple Intelligence,” the suite of AI-powered tools, enhancements, and integrations marks the company’s biggest software evolution in a decade. But unlike competitors racing to plug AI into everything, Apple is taking a slower, more deliberate approach — one rooted in privacy, on-device processing, and ecosystem synergy. If you’re wondering what Apple Intelligence actually is, how it works, and what it means for your iPhone, iPad, or Mac, you’re in the right place. This article breaks it all down.   What Is Apple Intelligence? Let’s get the terminology clear first. Apple Intelligence isn’t a product — it’s a platform. It’s not just a chatbot. It’s a system-wide integration of generative AI, machine learning, and personal context awareness, embedded across Apple’s OS platforms. Think of it as a foundational AI layer stitched into iOS 18, iPadOS 18, and m...
Post a Comment
Read more

Max Q: Anomalous

Hello and welcome back to Max Q! Last week wasn’t the most successful for spaceflight missions. We’ll get into that a bit more below. In this issue: First up, a botched launch from Virgin Orbit… …followed by one from ABL Space Systems News from Rocket Lab, World View and more Virgin Orbit’s botched launch highlights shaky financial future After Virgin Orbit’s launch failure last Monday, during which the mission experienced an  “anomaly” that prevented the rocket from reaching orbit, I went back over the company’s financials — and things aren’t looking good. For Virgin Orbit, this year has likely been completely turned on its head. The company was aiming for three launches this year, but everything will remain grounded until the cause of the anomaly has been identified and resolved. It’s unclear how long that will take, but likely at least three months. Add this delay to Virgin’s dwindling cash reserves and you have a foundation that’s suddenly much shakier than before. ...
Post a Comment
Read more