Ride-hailing firm Little pilots electronic bikes

Ride-hailing platform Little is piloting the rollout of electronic bikes (e-bikes) and scooters as it seeks to diversify revenue.

The company is from Monday next week expected to make available an estimated 200 e-bikes/scooters for rent across Nairobi County via its ride-hailing platform as it tests the demand for micro e-mobility.

“This is a learning process. We want to learn from the experience before rolling out the service to the rest of the country,” said Little Chief Executive Officer Kamal Budhabhatti.

The e-bikes will initially be rented out directly from the firm before the firm establishes designate spots around Nairobi including estates and universities for deployment.

Little currently owns the assets the project but plans to open it up to other stakeholders.

“We are a satellite company and only own assets in the pilot stage. We will be opening up the market so investors can purchase e-bikes and place them on our platform,” added Mr. Budhabhatti.

Little hopes the number of the motor-assisted vehicles can grow to 10,000 on its platform with Kenyans tipped to warm up to e-mobility.

“A few years back, the app based mobility solution came in and we were not sure if it could work or not. Today, this works seamlessly. I believe the same thing is going to work with e-mobility,” stated Kamal Budhabhatti.

The Little e-bike has range of up to 65 kilometres on a single charge while the motor assisted vehicle can reach speed of up to 25 kilometres per hour.