German micomobility provider Tier Mobility has acquired Ford-owned shared electric bike and scooter operator Spin, marking Tier’s entry into North America.

Following the recent acquisition of Europe’s largest bikeshare player Nextbike, Tier is already operating in over 410 cities with a fleet of 250,000 vehicles. With the purchase of Spin and its 50,000 vehicles, Tier has expanded its global footprint to more than 520 cities and communities in 21 countries and its fleet to 300,000 vehicles.

Tier says this makes it the largest multimodal micromobility operator globally.

Spin has strong city partnerships in North America, a history of city-focused innovation such as sidewalk riding detection technology and approaches to building successful charging infrastructure. Tier has safety features, the sustainability standards and its proprietary energy network and swappable battery technology.

“Tier’s acquisition of Spin and our entry into the North American market are huge milestones in our mission to change mobility for good,” said Lawrence Leuschner, CEO of Tier Mobility. “We are excited to support citizens in cities and communities across North America to make the switch from cars to more sustainable urban mobility, a switch that is urgently needed to decarbonise towns and cities across the world. We look forward to delivering this together with Spin who share our values of responsible partnership and sustainable vision.”

Together, Tier and Spin say they will continue to pioneer the development of standards and to build trust in e-scooters and e-bikes among communities and cities by enabling technology that creates a safer experience for riders, pedestrians and all other road users on both sides of the Atlantic. Investing in and modernising the Spin fleet with 100% swappable batteries will be one of upcoming projects to achieve environmental sustainability and efficiency in the North American micromobility industry.

“Tier and Spin share the same foundational view of how to deliver world-class micromobility services to cities and riders,” said Ben Bear, CEO of Spin. “Both companies believe in a partnership-first approach, operating with employees rather than contractors, and helping get people out of cars by offering sustainable, equitable and safe micromobility services. We couldn’t be more excited to continue scaling the Spin movement in North America as part of the Tier family. Together we will be the number-one choice of cities and riders globally.”

Franck Louis-Victor, vice president at Ford Motor, said: “We are proud Spin has become a trusted micromobility partner for cities across North America and the United Kingdom. We believe there are incredible synergies between Spin and Tier, and this new era will provide scale that’s desperately needed in the competitive micromobility sector. We are pleased to remain in the mix as a strategic investor in Tier and look forward to their continued growth.”

The purchase of Spin follows the recent acquisitions of Italy’s Wind Mobility, and of European bikeshare player Nextbike in 2021. In October 2021, Tier announced the first close of its $200m series D funding round. To date, Tier has raised $660m in equity and debt.

Spin recently restructured to focus on limited or single vendor markets where cities or campus officials select partners through a competitive procurement process. Due to Spin’s partnership focus, the company has retained all of its permits over the past five quarters. The markets where Spin chose to continue operating were collectively EBITDA positive over the past 12 months, an approach that aligns with Tier’s focus on building an environmentally and economically sustainable business. Spin’s team will continue in North America as a separate entity, while transferring its UK business to Tier at a later date.

The amount of the purchase price and further financial details of the transaction were not disclosed. JP Morgan acted as financial advisor, and White & Case acted as legal advisor to Tier on the transaction.

Founded in 2018 by Lawrence Leuschner, Matthias Laug and Julian Blessin, Tier is headquartered in Berlin.