The Company that Runs Blue Bikes in Boston Has Been Bought by Lyft
Motivate also runs Citi Bike and several other bike-sharing services.
Courtesy photo
Bike-sharing services like Boston’s Blue Bikes have exploded in popularity, and now Lyft is getting in on the action.
The ride-hailing service announced Monday that it’s buying New York-based Motivate, the company that runs Boston’s Blue Bikes (formerly known as Hubway), New York’s Citi Bike, and other similar services in San Francisco, Chicago, D.C., Portland, Columbus, and Minneapolis.
Lyft will absorb Motivate’s contracts with those cities, including the one that covers the more than 1,800 bikes currently deployed in Boston, Cambridge, Brookline, and Somerville.
“Lyft and Motivate have both been committed for years to the same goal of reducing the need for personal car ownership by providing reliable and affordable ways to move around our cities,” John Zimmer, Lyft co-founder and president, said in a statement. “Bringing together Lyft and Motivate will accelerate our collaboration with cities and deliver even better experiences to our passengers and riders.”
What does this mean for Blue Bike users? Very little. We should not expect any changes in the service in the short-term, although we may soon see some integration between the bike service and the Lyft app. Blue Bikes, which are so named thanks to a six-year sponsorship contract with Blue Cross Blue Shield, will continue to be known as Blue Bikes.
It’s not clear how much the acquisition cost. Other media outlets have suggested the price tag would be $250 million or more.
We founded Lyft with the mission to reduce personal car ownership. This is the latest step in our commitment towards that effort. Looking forward to what @lyft and @motivate_co will do together! https://t.co/ctMGVuGX87
— logangreen (@logangreen) July 2, 2018
