European micro-mobility operator Dott has launched its service in the French resort of Tignes for the summer season until September.

A fleet of shared e-scooters is available, helping visitors and residents to travel between Tignes le Lac, Val Claret and Lavachet.

The launch follows the success of the service in TIgnes last summer, and reinforces the commitment from the resort of Tignes towards a more sustainable and clean Alpine resort.

This month, Dott will host a training session to support the first visitors and resort teams by demonstrating the vehicles and encouraging safe riding.

“Following the popularity and high demand for our service last summer, we are pleased to renew our partnership with the resort this year,” said Manon Pagniez, general manager for the south of France at Dott. “We hope to encourage visitors and residents to try a new way to get around effortlessly, while reducing pollution and congestion on the roads.”

• For several months, Dott and Omni, a French start-up adapting wheelchairs to scooters, have been working together to develop an electric scooter for people with reduced mobility. Last month in front of the Philharmonie in Paris, the first prototype was tested. A larger experiment will take place in Paris by the end of this year.

Omni is a start-up from the Ile-de-France region of France and winner of the Grand Prix of the Lépine competition in 2021 for adapting e-scooters to wheelchairs. The partnership supports Dott’s objective to provide an adapted fleet in the public space for people in wheelchairs.

To transform the Dott e-scooter into a device suitable for everyday use by people in wheelchairs, Omni and Dott worked together to lower handlebars to the height of a person sitting in a wheelchair, offset of the handlebars for better comfort, avoiding pain in the arms and shoulders, and modify the speed controller, allowing a departure at 1km/h instead of 5km/h, given that people in wheelchairs cannot use their leg to start the e-scooter.

Moving around in a wheelchair in public spaces is often an obstacle course and a critical issue. This is particularly true in terms of mobility, as public transport still often requires significant assistance.

After several months of collaboration, Dott and Omni tested the OmniTrotter prototype on the forecourt of the Philharmonie de Paris. Following the successful experiment, the prototype will be further improved, then a first fleet of ten adapted scooters will be deployed in the Parisian public space before the end of 2022.

In addition to this prototype, Dott co-finances 55% of the rental price of 30 OmniTrotters in Paris, Lyon, Bordeaux, Marseille and Grenoble. This alternative to purchase removes what can be a barrier for many users.

“This partnership is particularly important for us at Dott,” said Nicolas Gorse vice president of Dott. “Firstly, because we have been working with Omni for over a year now and we are delighted to finally demonstrate this stage of our partnership. Secondly, because our mission is to make mobility accessible to as many people as possible. With the OmniTrotter, we allow people with reduced mobility to move around more easily in their daily lives.”

He said the feedback Dott received from the first users of the long-term rental programme was encouraging and exciting.

“People who were forced to use their car even for short distances can now use the Dott-Omni pack to commute,” said Gorse. “With the prototype, we want to move forward and propose an adapted self-service fleet in Paris by the end of the year.”

Charlotte Allaux, cofounder of Omni, added: “Inclusion in all its forms is very important to us at Omni. We are happy to have a major player in micro-mobility like Dott aligned with our vision and so involved in this subject. Our rental offer with Dott has already equipped many people with a personal electric scooter that they could not have afforded otherwise. Thanks to this partnership, it is possible to ride like everyone else and at the same price as everyone else. With this new project, the idea is to go even further by allowing people with reduced mobility to have access to self-service shared solutions on the street, a major step forward for people in wheelchairs to be like everyone else and get around freely.”