Cooltra partners with Dutch Felyx to strengthen its leadership in Europe

Cooltra takes a new step to consolidate its position as a European leader in the shared electric scooter sector. The Barcelona-based company, led by Timo Buetefisch, announced this Tuesday that it has reached a "merger" agreement with Felyx, a reference operator in the business ofmotosharingin the Netherlands and Belgium. According to Cooltra, which has not provided financial details or the structure of the operation,thanks to "this alliance" it enters two new countries and becomes the leader in the four largest markets in Europe: Spain, the Netherlands, France, and Italy.This agreement with Felyx comes a few days after Cooltra strengthened its position in France by acquiring Cityscoot, a company that was in receivership  and which is the ohistorical operator of motosharing in Paris. Now, with the agreement with Felyx, a group is created that will offer 28,000 vehicles, of which 16,000 are electric and shared, with a presence in 30 cities in six European countries, where they control a market share of over 50%. Between both operators, they add up to more than 3.5 million users in cities such as Barcelona, Madrid, Rome, Milan, Turin, Paris, Lisbon, Brussels, Rotterdam, and The Hague. The alliance will not imply a unification of brands, as Cooltra will continue to operate with its own in Spain, Italy, France, and Portugal, while Felyx will remain in the Netherlands and Belgium. The respective mobile applications will also continue to function, although "a convergence in the future" is not ruled out. "We are constantly observing the market for growth opportunities in shared electric mobility, and we are very excited about this particular step", Buetefisch, CEO and co-founder of Cooltra, explained. "Partnering with Felyx is not just about expanding our borders; it's about joining forces with a respected and established company to advance towards our common goal of becoming the leading provider of two-wheel mobility solutions in Europe," he added. "This merger marks an important milestone for Felyx. We were looking for a collaboration that would improve our position in our markets in the Netherlands and Belgium. This operation also opens the doors to new business opportunities for Felyx in the Benelux area. Cooltra, with its strength and proven track record, fits perfectly with our objectives, paving the way for an exciting future as we continue to expand and innovate," Daan Becker, CEO of Felyx, has highlighted for his part. The Netherlands is the second most important European market in motosharing, with 7.3 million rentals per year, behind Spain, which totals 7.9 million rentals. France and Italy account for 4.2 million and 3.8 million, respectively.Cooltra has not revealed how this "merger" operation is structured in terms of shareholding, limiting itself to explaining that it is "an integration of companies to join forces and synergies under the same group."

Felyx was founded in 2017 in Amsterdam. It started with the rental of 100 shared electric mopeds and today has a fleet of 6,000 fully electric vehicles spread across 21 cities in the Netherlands and Brussels. For its part, Cooltra was born in 2006 in Barcelona with a fleet of 50 motorcycles for rent to tourists and residents. Today it owns 21,000 vehicles and more than 400 workers. In addition to electric scooter rentals by the minute, the company has a B2B division, managing fleets for other companies and for Public Administrations. Under the modalities of renting or selling, in the last five years it has delivered, for example, more than a thousand vehicles to different police forces, such as the Mossos d'Esquadra and Seprona.

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