When Stewart Lyons stepped in as Co-CEO of Bird and Spin in early 2023, he inherited two of micromobility’s most recognised, but recently beleaguered, brands. A year later, the companies merged under a new umbrella: Third Lane Mobility.
Officially launched in March 2024, Third Lane Mobility emerged as a restructured and reenergised business with a clear aim: profitability. The consolidation marks a strategic reset for the two operators, which were founded during the early boom years of shared micromobility; Bird in 2017, followed by Spin roughly a year later.
The early months of 2024 were focused on internal restructuring or “getting our house in order,” as Lyons puts it. That effort paid off quickly. “We came out with a bang in March,” he tells Zag Daily, “and we were profitable from the get-go.”
In contrast to previous years of losses, Third Lane delivered profitability every month from March to December 2024. That turnaround was underpinned by a comprehensive overhaul of the business.
“We looked at everything from the business model we deploy in cities, to the level of operational expense, insurance, rent, everything,” Lyons says. “It was about right-sizing to match the scale of the business we had built.”
By the end of 2024, the company had logged 35 million rides, $220 million in gross receipts, and nearly $20 million in adjusted EBITDA, a major shift in an industry long dogged by questions of financial viability.
From burn to balance
Reversing a $30 million EBITDA loss at Bird in 2023 was not a matter of cosmetic restructuring. “Bird had a history of chasing top-line growth at all costs, too many hires, too many markets,” says Lyons. “We had to right-size everything.”
The leadership team scrutinised expenses top to bottom: payroll, leases, insurance, and how vehicles are sourced and deployed, before making sweeping changes.
One of the more radical shifts came in hardware. “Initially, Bird designed, contracted and manufactured all its vehicles in China, building them from the ground up with in-house engineering teams,” explains Lyons. “But over time, Chinese manufacturers became very good at building high-quality scooters themselves. The difference between what we could design internally and what we could buy off-the-shelf, with some customisation, became negligible.”
Third Lane Mobility now primarily sources its vehicles from Segway-Ninebot, with additional units from Okai and other Chinese suppliers. “They’ve been a good partner for us,” he says. “We customise the hardware to some degree, and the customer-facing software and app is entirely ours. The manufacturer applies our suggested modifications to the IoT and firmware. It’s really the perfect blend—very similar to how things evolved in the mobile phone business.”
Operations saw similar recalibration. Bird once leaned heavily on its decentralised fleet manager (FM) model, outsourcing daily operations. Today, Third Lane employs a blended model, bringing some operations in-house while retaining outsourced partners in select markets on a task-based basis. “It’s helped with cost, uptime, and vehicle lifespan,” Lyons says.
One of the steepest historical costs for micromobility firms in the U.S. has been insurance, driven by high litigation risk and legacy claims. “Early players like Bird and Lime became targets,” says Lyons. “Some claims were real, many weren’t.”
Third Lane’s restructuring allowed it to draw a line under much of that history. Lyons keeps the details vague, calling insurance strategy a “competitive advantage,” but confirms that leveraging a regional approach has reduced premiums significantly.”
Double branding, single focus
The acquisition of Bird and Spin has allowed Third Lane Mobility to cultivate a dual-brand strategy that it views as a competitive strength. While Bird remains focused on dense urban markets and major metropolitan areas, Spin has carved out a role as the university town specialist, with a strong presence in the US southeast and smaller city environments.
The decision to preserve both brand identities, rather than consolidate under a single name, was a deliberate strategic move informed by Lyons’ experience across industries. Drawing on a career that has spanned wireless, satellite radio, cloud computing and networking, he argues that maintaining multiple customer-facing brands is not unusual in other sectors.
“Procter & Gamble has about 50 different brands under its umbrella,” he notes. “In telecoms, it’s also a common approach. It’s not new to business, but it is unusual in micromobility.”
That kind of thinking is what Lyons believes enabled Bird to pull off a dramatic $50 million swing in EBITDA over the past year. While he is quick to note that the turnaround was not the result of any single initiative, he credits a shift in mindset as the crucial first step.
“We had to treat every market, every city, like an individual business and each one had to be profitable,” he explains. “That sounds obvious, but in this industry, it hasn’t been the norm. Head office costs were weighing cities down.”
One major cost saving mechanism came from renegotiating the company’s global SIM contract.
As Lyons explains, each e-scooter or e-bike requires a SIM card to connect to a mobile network, just like a smartphone. The cost of these connectivity contracts can vary dramatically depending on how they are structured.
“There are roaming aggregators that provide global coverage. But if you just go to one and say, ‘I want a SIM that works everywhere’, you’ll get a very uncompetitive rate.”
Thanks to his telecoms background, Lyons was able to renegotiate these contracts and cut associated costs by up to 80%. “It wasn’t quite in the double-digit millions, but close,” he says
These kinds of decisions underpinned Third Lane’s financial turnaround. “There’s no silver bullet,” he adds. “That $50 million swing came from 20 significant decisions, not one.”
Riding high into 2025
With the restructuring in the rearview mirror Third Lane has entered 2025 with a burst of momentum, buoyed by a 33% year-on-year increase in ridership during the first quarter.
Vehicle deployments are now moving at a faster clip than they were a year ago, and the company is in the midst of rolling out a major fleet expansion: up to 45,000 new vehicles, mostly e-bikes, will be delivered in phases across North America and Europe. This expansion is being driven by what Lyons describes as strong and growing demand, with new city launches playing a central role.
Third Lane is gearing up to enter 50 new cities in 2025, including major additions like Minneapolis, Fort Myers, and Munich. Several of these, such as St. Louis, Tampa, and Halifax, come with exclusive operating rights, something Lyons sees as a sign that cities are increasingly eager to work with a more disciplined operator.
He believes the company’s renewed focus and financial discipline are changing how it’s perceived by regulators. “This is a different situation than it was in the past,” he says. “Cities are seeing us as a focused, profitable, great partner that they want to grow with.”
Today, Third Lane operates in more than 200 cities around the world with a fleet approaching 180,000 vehicles. While scooters still make up the bulk (about 85%) the mix is shifting. The latest batch of deliveries is predominantly e-bikes, reflecting growing demand for bikes across Europe and, increasingly, in North America too.
Prague recently banned scooters, following Paris’s lead, and London, while technically allowing scooters, is firmly a bike-first environment. But such policy changes are part of the territory, and Lyons says the company is used to adjusting on the fly.
One potential headwind: rising tariffs on Chinese-made vehicles. “It’s not helpful,” Lyons says plainly. While the company explores near-shoring and new suppliers, the current import costs could be millions. A possible exemption reinstatement could ease the pressure.
Still, he remains optimistic: “We’ve built a business that can withstand challenges and keep growing.”
