STACK #202 Aug 2021

LIFE TECH FEATURE

BEST IN CLASS

The Unagi Model One exudes prestige, and there’s a good reason for that. Paul Jones spoke with Unagi CEO, David Hyman.

“I ’m a music nut and I’ve done music start-ups for 25 years. I was just ready to mix it up and ready for change.” David Hyman, the dynamic CEO of Unagi Scooters, is indeed a music nut. Long before he embarked on his latest business venture into the world of micro-mobility, the sagacious entrepreneur pioneered the first online music destination with an ex- Rolling Stone editor in ’94 and was at the forefront of the evolution of digital music. Have you ever wondered how the tracks on a ripped CD would show up in perfect order on an iPod? Yep, that was him. In 2005, Hyman founded MOG, one of the world’s first subscription music platforms, that would eventually morph into the widely popular Apple Music streaming service. While music remains an intrinsic part of his DNA, Hyman is a technology guy at heart, and the idea to kickstart an electric scooter business was born on the streets of San Francisco. When the Lime scooter ride-share scheme first launched, Hyman was an early adopter, but soon became exasperated with the model. “I got frustrated with ride-sharing. Every

morning, trying to find one was a game I would have to play,” he explains. “Then half the time the batteries would be dead, or they would be broken. “The final straw came when I was riding my Lime scooter to Whole Foods [a US supermarket chain] one weekend. When I came out with my groceries, my scooter was gone! That’s how the rental system works. I’d just

bought a seven-dollar pint of ice cream and it was 75 degrees outside and my scooter was gone! “And then I thought, ‘I have worked 25 years building these software companies, I could buy one of these scooters, why am I messing around with this ride- sharing?’” Hyman became obsessed with finding the perfect e-scooter, searching the globe for an answer. Ride-share scooters are heavy, designed to be vandal-proof and left out on the streets in all weather

conditions; what Hyman wanted was a lightweight scooter he could take on public transport. “I live about 15 minutes outside San Francisco, so I wanted to ride the scooter to the subway, take it on the subway, and then ride to San Francisco for meetings,” he explains. “I was trying to find something that had a lot of torque and power to get up hills in the bay area; something lightweight with a lot of range.

No-one was building scooters with any kind of quality and aesthetic, so that was the impetus behind Unagi

58 AUGUST 2021

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