SO, W HAT’S GOING ON IN

SMART MOBILITY
Madrid, May 2019

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 CONTENTS

4 What is Smart Mobility?

6 Mobility Challenges
8 Addressing the Challenges
9 1. Enhanced Urban Mobility
25 2. Increased Goods Demand: Logistics & cargo
31 3. Infrastructure Development
40 4. Sustainability
51 Afterword

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3
1. WHAT IS SMART MOBILITY?

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 1. WHAT IS SMART MOBILITY?

Smart Mobility is becoming a ubiquitous term, however, it encompasses

much more than car sharing or micro-mobility. The concept is made out of a
series of functional principles that define its operating framework.

‣ Flexibility: The goal is to create a multi-modal transportation mode which

allows the user the flexibility to change the type of transportation depending
on their necessities.

‣ Efficiency: Planning a trip should be as efficient, minimizing the time needed

to our destination while maximizing the traveler’s comfort.

‣ Integration: The planned route should take us door-to-door, no matter what

transportation we use. In other words, it becomes user-centric.

‣ Zero emissions: The technology employed should strive for sustainability

and clean energies.

‣ Safety: The goal is to reduce the number of accidents and deaths related to
transportation.

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5
2. MOBILITY CHALLENGES

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 2. MOBILITY CHALLENGES

Such push towards the city borders, even though

Never before in human’s history, we’ve experienced
it’s the natural way expansion happens, produces
a more significant concentration around urban
two significant challenges. On the one hand, how to
areas than the one we’re facing today. In 2017,
provide public transportation to those areas as
more than half the global population lived in cities.
their growth is faster than the expansion efforts of
The ratio of country-to-urban migration keeps
the public transport network. On the other hand,
increasing, and, according to the UN, in 2050, we
how do we prevent all those new inhabitants from
might have nearly 70% of the global population
having to commute to the city center while
in cities1.
diversifying the location of business districts?
This situation of exponential urban growth is
generating an increasing number of challenges for Chatter around mobility services
cities. One of them is the capacity to absorb 60
significant migration flows into the city. In most
50
cases, the limited supply of housing in central
districts is rising real estate prices, both ownership 40
and rentals. The fast increase of expenses (which is
also affected by other factors like the growth of 30
short-term rentals or real estate speculation), is 20
gentrifying many city centers and pushing big
chunks of the population to the outskirts. 10

0
2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018

1 https://www.un.org/development/desa/publications/graphic/world-urbanization-prospects-2018-

more-megacities-in-the-future
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 2. MOBILITY CHALLENGES

Both these situations are highlighting the need to

Smart Mobility Evolution –
rethink how large cities design their transportation
offer. Moving forward, the capacity to dynamically South Summit Competition
grow or shrink a city’s transportation capacity is a
must. Driveless Car

Mobility

If this wasn’t enough, changes in consumer IoT

behavior are also straining the transportation of Geolocalization

goods worldwide, both between countries and Transport

last-mile delivery operations. The expectation that Smart Cities
our packages will arrive in under 48 hours is Logistics
triggering massive challenges for both retailers and
Drones
logistic operators.
Aerospace

Automotive
Due to all these challenges, the mobility industry is
0% 50% 100% 150% 200% 250%
undergoing a profound transformation. Those
systems that evolve, adapt, and become smarter 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019*
and more efficient will be the only ones left
standing. Source: Spain Startup – South Summit

*Provisional results for 2019. South Summit

Competition open at the time of release.

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8
3. ADDRESSING THE CHALLENGES

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 3.1. Enhanced Urban Mobility
Automation

One of the most disruptive technologies out

there is, without a doubt, autonomous
vehicles. Its disruptive potential isn’t limited to
the mobility space, but many other industries
from logistics to insurance to mining.

Each month, new verticals are adopting the

technology. From last-mile autonomous
vehicles like Ford and Agility Robotics recent
announcement; to Nuro’s billion dollar
investment to the multiple autonomous truck
pilots launched by the US Post Office in
America, Einride in Sweden or Rio Tinto in
Australia.

However, most pilots are still operating at a

small scale and under controlled environments,
let it be low-traffic good-weather locations,
restricted warehouses, or company campuses.

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 3.1. Enhanced Urban Mobility
Removing Barriers: Legislation

The speed of legislation around autonomous vehicles is quickening, both in the US and in
Asia. While most legislation is still a testing framework, it's, for the moment, not the biggest
roadblock for large scale adoption. There is an increasing number of cities, municipalities, or
regions around the world that are sharing best practices for autonomous vehicle regulation
frameworks.

“To keep up with the United States, China laid out national guidelines for testing
self-driving cars in April last year. City governments have followed suit. Beijing,
Chongqing, Shenzhen, and Guangzhou, in addition to Shanghai, have opened
their roads to AVs.”

“Mapping out the road ahead for China’s autonomous vehicles”. Technode.
Feb 2019 .
(https://technode.com/2019/02/07/china-av-roadmap/)

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 3.1. Enhanced Urban Mobility
Removing Barriers: Legislation

Source: http://www.ncsl.org/research/transportation/autonomous-vehicles-self-driving-vehicles-enacted-legislation.aspx
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 3.1. Enhanced Urban Mobility
Removing Barriers: Legislation

While the US has led the last innovation wave, China is taking the lead when it comes to the
use and development of Artificial Intelligence, the underlying technology behind Autonomous
Vehicles. Baidu has been investing in autonomous technology since 2016 and currently holds
the Chinese record of autonomous miles driven (nearly 140.000 Km). Even though its US
competitor, Waymo has the global record, (almost 16 million Km), it's worth noting that roads
in China are nothing like what you have in the US.

“Baidu is already testing its software on public roads. In December, Beijing

granted Baidu permission to test on 33 public roads in the city. These roads
yield 65 miles for testing, which tracks well above what other AV companies in
China have reported.”

“Android of the Auto Industry? How Baidu May Race Ahead Of Google, Tesla,
And Others In Autonomous Vehicles”. CBInsights. Jun 2018.
(https://www.cbinsights.com/research/baidu-china-autonomous-vehicles/)

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 3.1. Enhanced Urban Mobility
Removing Barriers: Legislation

Source: http://jtw.beijing.gov.cn/xxgk/zxgkxx/201903/t20190329_200972.html

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 3.1. Enhanced Urban Mobility
Mobility Integration

One of the crucial concepts of Smart Mobility is

door-to-door planning and integration employing
any transportation combination. The explosion
of alternative transportation offerings is
propitiating the rise of aggregation services.
These applications allow users to plant door-to-
door trips while combining many different
transport options (Mobility as a Service or
MaaS): public transport, car/ride sharing,
bicycles, eScooters, etc.

Precisely because most transportation services

are getting digitalized, it's easy to make such
integration and aggregation. This ease is
making it easy for many players to compete, and
it's littering the market with copycats and quasi-
identical offerings. The only practical advantage
for such apps is to perform deeper integrations
with the mobility operators. However, few have
such ties.

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 3.1. Enhanced Urban Mobility
Mobility Integration

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 3.1. Enhanced Urban Mobility
Mobility Integration

At the same time, mobility brands have a similar

issue among each other- Their offerings are
alike, and the user's cost of switching is close to
zero. The consequence is that brand loyalty is
nonexistent.

To increase their moat, some of these mobility

companies are developing their own multi-modal
aggregator applications. The move is interesting
because, as owners of one or several mobility
options, they can deeply integrate these,
creating a much more compelling offering than
the outsiders, while simultaneously creating a
differentiation point with their mobility
competitors due to their application layer
advantage (i.e. Moovel by Daimler).

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 3.1. Enhanced Urban Mobility
Mobility Integration

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 3.1. Enhanced Urban Mobility
Mobility Integration

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 3.1. Enhanced Urban Mobility
Mobility Sharing
One of the most substantial shifts in the industry
has been the transition from vehicle
ownership to vehicle-as-a-service. This
change, which is a convergence of technological
readiness and behavioral change, is rocking the
pillars of the auto industry. The speed at which
the population has shifted from owning a
transport medium to sharing it has been
spectacular.
This shift isn’t casual. It’s being fueled by the
need to reduce the burden around commuting
in a city. Owning a car has many challenges in
today’s urban context. For starters, the user is
required to pay upfront, nevermind if the vehicle
is being used or not. On top of that, the user
takes care of the maintenance, fuel, insurance,
and parking costs. If that’s not enough, in many
crowded cities, parking space is scarce and
forces users to drive endlessly until they can
stop the vehicle.
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Car Sharing removes all of those issues and only
charges the user for the time the vehicle is in
use. Car Sharing companies need three things to
achieve efficiencies: efficient and sustainable
energy (electrification of cars), tight integration
of the value chain (owning the batteries-car-
service trio) and smart fleet management
systems that can predict when and where
vehicles are needed.
While owning a tight integration, margins are still
low for a single city deployment. Big profit will
only happen if efficient operations are deployed
in multiple cities around the world. More cities
aren’t just important for the scale of the business
but to the retention of users. Like WeWork, the
fact that a Lyft or Car2Go user can go to other
cities and use their already active app lowers the
user’s friction and ensures customer retention.
This last metric is the angular stone for vehicle
sharing companies. As most offers have little
differentiation capacity, one of the best lock-in
mechanisms is that of global ubiquity.
 3.1. Enhanced Urban Mobility
Mobility Sharing

As the segment has been maturing, the model has spread to the lower and upper parts of the
market. The ‘free-floating’ nature of many of the vehicle sharing fleets has created a new segment
for micro-mobility, where smaller ubiquitous vehicles like eScooters or bikes can help users go
from the departing point to where the shared vehicle is (generally under 1 km).

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 3.1. Enhanced Urban Mobility
Mobility Sharing

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 3.1. Enhanced Urban Mobility
Mobility Sharing

“Companies find it much easier to scale up micromobility

assets (for example, electric bikes) compared with car-based
sharing solutions. For example, the current acquisition costs of
an electric scooter are about $400, compared with the
thousands of dollars required to purchase a car. Thus, while
today’s car-sharing solutions need several years to become
economically viable, an outside-in business-case estimate of a
leader in shared mobility shows that an e-scooter could break
even in less than four months.”

“Micromobility’s 15,000-mile checkup.” McKinsey Insights.

Jan 2019.
(https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/automotive-and-
assembly/our-insights/micromobilitys-15000-mile-checkup)

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 3.1. Enhanced Urban Mobility
Mobility Sharing

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 3.1. Enhanced Urban Mobility
Mobility Sharing

Despite such numbers, micro-mobility companies are even more at risk of market cannibalization. The
differentiation factor between companies is , and as we saw, the cost of entry is much lower than with
larger vehicles like cars. Even with rapid adoption, the plethora of competitors is eroding everyone’s
margins. During the next few years, we’ll witness the downfall of many of these players and a market
consolidation from those with deeper pockets and smarter operations. Tight integration with upscale
options, will be the norm if they want to survive.

“But costly battles for market share have meant Ofo, and its rivals have struggled to turn
popularity into profit. Ofo’s very survival is now at risk as debts to suppliers have come due,
and user demands for deposits have mounted.

“It’s a very tricky business, all the profits are eaten away by competition. It’s something that
really needs to be part of a bigger business,” said Maxwell Zhou, founder of tech startup
metaapp.cn and a former employee of Mobike in China.”

“Bike-sharing firm Ofo's dramatic fall a warning to China's tech investors.” Reuters. Dec
2018.
(https://www.reuters.com/article/us-ofo-china/bike-sharing-firm-ofos-dramatic-fall-a-warning-
to-chinas-tech-investors-idUSKCN1ON0B8)

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 3.2. Increased Goods Demand: Logistics & Cargo
Automation: Logistics & Operations

While many industries are still far from running a fully automated value chain, innovations
on the autonomous vehicles field are allowing rapid integrations of certain parts, reducing
costs and increasing the efficiency.

In particular, the use of such technology is especially acute in the logistics industry.
From autonomous warehouse robots (Fetch Robotics, Canvas Technologies, Geek+,
inVia Robotics or Vecna Robotics), autonomous drones for last-mile delivery, to
autonomous robots capable of packing our online orders in no time.

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 3.2. Increased Goods Demand: Logistics & Cargo
Integration: Freight Forwarding

The growth and expansion of giants like Amazon

As with urban transportation, door-to-door
or Alibaba (i.e., AliExpress) and the need to
planning and shipping of goods are becoming
compete with their delivery and cost-
increasingly important. Digitalization of the goods
effectiveness are becoming a significant drive in
value chain has always lagged in comparison
the industry. Some good examples of this trend
with the final customer-facing counterparts. This
are Softbank's one billion dollars investment in
lack of digital control also placed the whole value
Flexport or the more recent 20 million dollars
chain in the hands of a few, and thus effectively
round of Zencargo.
creating an oligopoly.

Some startups like Flexport or more recently,

Zencargo have been pushing for the digitalization
for some years now, something that's taking time
and money. Thanks to them, the 'freight
forwarding' space is finally seeing some
democratization and allowing for others to enter
and disrupt it. This crop of companies are
applying the same concept of multi-modal travel
but applied to goods (i.e., Kontainers,
iContainers), offering door-to-door planning,
pricing, insurance, and tracking at a global scale.

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 3.2. Increased Goods Demand: Logistics & Cargo
Integration: Ports

While some companies are integrating the end to end experience and democratizing the offer,
others like TuSimple (also technical partners for the US Post Office autonomous truck's pilot and
one of China's leaders in autonomous trucks), is trying to integrate the maritime loading and
offloading of goods.

Since last year, they've been closely working with several ports worldwide like Caofeidian (200
Km to the southeast of Beijing), to build the first fully autonomous port in the world by integrating
their autonomous cranes with their trucks.

“The potential for efficiencies has many ports interested in automation. Qingdao said
its systems allow the terminal to operate in complete darkness and have reduced
labor costs by 70 percent while increasing efficiency by 30 percent. In some cases,
the number of workers needed to unload a cargo ship has gone from 60 to 9.”

“Chinese Port Goes Full Robot With Autonomous Trucks and Cranes.”
Singularity Hub. May 2018.
(https://singularityhub.com/2018/05/17/chinese-port-goes-full-robot-with-autonomous-
trucks-and-cranes/)

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 3.2. Increased Goods Demand: Logistics & Cargo
Efficiency: Blockchain

Global freight forwarding is a complex multi-sided process that involves multiple entities. Much
of this process is heavy in documentation and poorly integrated. To improve the process and
bring transparency to the whole endeavor, several companies are applying Blockchain
technology to add a layer of trust and clarity. Many of these startups won't use Blockchain as a
hook but as a useful tool to accelerate the end-to-end digitalization and tracking of global
commerce. It's worth saying that this effort will take years and with time, the term 'Blockchain'
will be so ubiquitous that it won't require a mention.

1 https://www.un.org/development/desa/publications/graphic/world-urbanization-prospects-2018-

more-megacities-in-the-future
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 3.2. Increased Goods Demand: Logistics & Cargo
Flexibility: Uber for Trucks

The same point-to-point integration that's happening in the shipping industry, it's also happening in
ground transportation. The new space, nicknamed 'Uber for Trucks' is exploding with new startups
carving a local market for themselves (i.e., Convoy, Transfix, Cargomatic, uShip or Cargo42 in the US,
CargoX in Brazil, Senndr and InstaFreight in Germany, Fretlink in France or OnTruck in España).

There is one significant difference between

the integration of maritime transportation and
the ground one. On the first case, the
operations need to have global scope for it to
matter. Achieving this takes plenty of
knowledge, financing, and time. In the case
of ground transportation integrations, due to
the local nature of most truck companies,
many startups focus on owning the local
market first and expand later on. This
process is less capital intensive and requires
a much shorter timeline. The drawback
though is that the barriers of entry are lower,
and that's the reason why we're observing a
fierce battle between many of the startups of
the space.

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 3.2. Increased Goods Demand: Logistics & Cargo
Amazon Case

As we mentioned before, Amazon is one of the most

important reasons why the logistics and operations
industry is doubling down on their digitalization efforts.
Amazon casts a long shadow on many retail categories
like clothes, food, or drugs, and as it expands into other
verticals, the pressure and need for automation of their
competitors grows. However, Amazon's operational
excellence and accelerated growth are putting many of
its competitors in jeopardy.

Since 2012, Amazon has been investing heavily in the

automation of their operations. This past few years,
they've gone on a buying spree ( Kiva Technologies,
Dispatch or most recently Canvas Technologies),
acquiring and integrating some of the top autonomous
robot companies in the world. Their strategic focus on
autonomous robots is such that not long ago, they started
an independent unit called Amazon Robotics. Within this
unit, they've been developing tools to help train such
robots (AWS RoboMaker), creating a whole new Robot-
as-a-Service stack for Amazon Web Services (AWS).

1 https://www.un.org/development/desa/publications/graphic/world-urbanization-prospects-2018-

more-megacities-in-the-future
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 3.3. Infrastructure Development
5G
The cornerstone of Smart Mobility is intelligent
infrastructure. Without smart grids, connected
devices, or sustainable energy, it would be tough
to evolve the industry. One of the most critical
elements of the Smart Mobility infrastructure is
access to fast and instant mobile
communications, especially with the exponential
growth of our connected devices (Internet of
Things).
Data usage from and towards all kinds of
vehicles, especially those with autonomous
properties (location services, 3D maps updates,
sensory information, etc.) will grow exponentially
in the following years. The needs for more
bandwidth will also increase as we keep
developing advanced onboard entertainment
systems (think of Virtual Reality movies in your
car) which we will increasingly use as we free
ourselves from driving the vehicle itself.
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The current mobile network infrastructure isn't
enough for the kind of load that Smart Mobility
requires. This is why the deployment of the next
generation 5G network will be so critical to the
growth of the industry.
One of the critical aspects of 5G deployment will
be the network's coverage. While 5G promises
larger bandwidth and decreased latency, the
reach of the signal is severely limited. As the city
outgrows its center, the deployment of 5G on the
outskirts will have to go on par with the speed of
the growth. A lack of coverage will translate to
deficient or severely impaired services,
especially the autonomous type, for the
population pushed away by gentrification.
 3.3. Infrastructure Development
5G

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 3.3. Infrastructure Development
Microsatellites and global tracking
As critical as 5G will be for Smart Mobility, no
one said it has to be a ground deployment. The
decreased cost of building and launching a
microsatellite is opening a real opportunity for
companies to build a 5G network in space.
One of the companies doing this is Elon Musk's
SpaceX, which recently launched 60
microsatellites for Starlink, their low-orbit
constellation. Owning a 5G network in space
isn't just about communications, but about
acquiring global coverage at a reasonable price.
For now, researchers are still developing high-
speed satellite-to-satellite communication
systems, but we should expect functional
advances in the next few years. SpaceX isn't the
only company attempting to obtain
communication supremacy in space. Amazon is
getting ready to launch their low orbit
constellation comprised of more than 3000
microsatellites.
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The cheapening of operating in space is giving
way to a whole new industry dubbed Space as a
Service, or the 'AirBnB of Space.' Startups
working in that vertical rent their space
operations apparatus for third parties, like Smart
Mobility companies, to build, launch, and operate
microsatellite constellations without the need to
invest in building a dedicated unit for it.
The value of such low orbit constellations isn't
only in their communications capabilities, but on
the capacity to monitor and predict the
movement of goods across the world. Integration
between such tracking systems and the new
point-to-point 'freight forwarding' startups is
completely disrupting logistics. It's not surprising
then that Amazon wants to join in and integrate
space into their current operations.
 3.3. Infrastructure Development
Microsatellites and global tracking

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 3.3. Infrastructure Development
New transportation systems

Smart Mobility isn’t only about improving existing transportation technology, but about creating
disruptive new ways of transportation. To that extent, we explore some different avenues that might
open new radical means of transport.

‣ Hyperloop: Maglev train meets the
pneumatic tube. The technology that makes
Hyperloop possible has existed for quite
some time. Traditional maglev trains
already exist in three countries (Japan,
Korea, and China) but their costs at the
time were prohibitive. Current technologies
are allowing for traditional maglev
technology to rival with Hyperloop, which is
still experimental and were costs derived
from the construction of low pressure tubes
that are elevated off the ground are
expected to balloon. The irony though is
that the rivalry between hyperloop initiatives
(Elon Musk’s especially) and maglev
companies are bringing the spotlight back
to available technology.
‣ Drones: There has been much talk around
drones both for goods transportation as well
as people. Some of the most intriguing
ideas are around air-taxi’s. While the
technology is there (i.e., Lillium, the
Munich-based startup that just successfully
completed its first test flight with a five-
seater all-electric vertical take-off and
landing jet prototype), the logistics and air
control challenges are still to be dealt with.
On top of that, the scale we would need to
reduce stress over our current
transportation modes is not there yet.

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 3.3. Infrastructure Development
New materials, new possibilities

Despite the fantastic technology we possess nowadays, research on new materials will offer even more
disruption than some of our software hacks. Three main research areas might yield big wins for
transportation in general.

‣ High-Density Batteries: One of the limiting

factors in the adoption of electric vehicles
has always been the batteries. While
innovations in Lithium-Ion batteries have
enabled Tesla to race ahead in the
automotive market, these batteries are
insufficient for the realistic deployment of
large scale electric aircraft. Innovations in
high-density batteries (i.e., 24M, Cuberg) are
getting closer and will power the first hybrid
airplane from Zunum Aero. That said, most
experts believe we’re still 10-20 years behind
developing powerful enough batteries to
power the big carriers. The recent
discoveries around Graphene mentioned
below, though, could change that too.

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 3.3. Infrastructure Development
New materials, new possibilities
‣ 3D Printing: The improvement of 3D Printing
technology in the last two years has been
extraordinary. We’ve gone from printers for
hobbyists to industrial-grade printers and
generative design. New manufacturing
methods are enabling the construction of
more efficient transportation, including
modular cars or cheaper rocket engines (and
less expensive satellite operations). On top
of that, as 3D Printing expands its range of
materials, it will eventually get to a point
where we only need to print the newest
gizmo instead of having to ship it — remotely
printed food, clothes, furniture, etc. The
‘practical’ teleportation of matter could
drastically reduce the need for specific type
of transportation.
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‣ Graphene: Research around this flexible
material is heating up, and some of the latest
research (Twistronics) could turn it into The
material. New investigations have discovered
how to turn Graphene into a superconductor,
which enables its use in, among many things,
magnetic levitation trains or maglev
(including Hyperloop), but reducing its costs
and turning it into something affordable
worldwide. With maximum speeds of 600
Km/h, its mass deployment could transform
transportation for everyone.
 3.3. Infrastructure Development
Governance & transport planning

The economic war between the US and China is having severe consequences for the
technological development of the Asian giant. As Trump moves to ban the use of critical US
Intellectual Property in China, the top Asian technology firms will struggle to substitute many of
their current components. Is all-too-probable that the ongoing autonomous vehicle development
in China will take a hit because of it.

However, despite the potential setback, The biggest winners will be those European
China's most significant advantage is its companies that can provide the Asian
massive manufacturing capacity. The country with advanced technology to replace
capability of building autonomous vehicles their edge, as their market will be
trumps any possible lower quality. Quality significantly increased, as Daimler is doing.
will eventually increase as China begins
replacing US intellectual Property with their
improved designs like what's already
happening in the semiconductor industry.

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 3.3. Infrastructure Development
Integration & accessability
The next big companies in the Smart Mobility
space won't only need autonomous technology, but
the capacity to integrate such innovation within a
much broader value chain. Technology alone won't
provide world domination, but the ability to scale
will. Many of the new entrants in the field have close
to no experience when it comes to manufacturing
their vehicles or robots.
39
A good cautionary tale is the significant challenges
Tesla suffered through 2018 when trying to increase
their new model through output. Not only they failed
at it, but their reliance on China to do so is putting
the company in jeopardy, including the development
of the 'brain' of their cars.
On the other hand, their competitor Waymo decided
to build their factories in the US, more specifically in
Detroit, the heart of the auto industry. The highly
strategic move kills three birds with one stone. It
protects Google from any dependency with China; it
gives them access to a unique pool of auto
manufacturing talent, and lastly, it allows them to
collect subsidies from the government.
 3.4. Sustainability
Zero Emissions: Environment
The global growth of megacities is accelerating
many of the environmental problems. It's becoming
usual for governments both national and regional to
pass new regulations that dramatically limit CO2
emissions in the city. The convergence of these
factors and the geopolitical necessity to eliminate
the dependence on fossil fuel is one of the reasons
for the rapid ascent of electric vehicles.
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The need for zero emissions vehicles is one of the
main principles of Smart Mobility. The need for
better and more sustainable transportation and the
appearance and evolution of electric vehicles is the
perfect symbiosis. However, to replace our
combustion engine car army, we'll need deep
integrations between mobility operators and energy
infrastructure providers.
 3.4. Sustainability
Zero Emissions: Environment

Due to the nascent nature of the electric vehicle industry, where there are limited or nonavailable
innovations, the best course of action, even if expensive, is a tight vertical integration. To that avail,
those companies that combine all the pieces (vehicles, charging stations, navigation planning, and
generation and energy storage) will have a significant edge in the market. This verticalization is
precisely what companies like Tesla or Daimler have been doing for several years now. The result is
that they are years ahead of most of their competitors.

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 3.4. Sustainability
Flexibility: Removing barriers

As mentioned before, the need for integration between electric vehicles (EVs) and infrastructure is
critical. The capacity to develop good coverage of the fast charging station network is essential for
widespread adoption.

This deployment of the charging infrastructure isn't easy or cheap. It requires significant investments
and in some cases, a complete upgrade of the low and medium voltage electric networks. As more
users choose electric vehicles (EVs), the current (low-voltage) grid will suffer under the load.

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 3.4. Sustainability
Flexibility: Removing barriers

Even though the current EVs consumption is

negligible, compared with other industries, the move
towards all kinds of autonomous or connected
devices will increase the need for sustainable
sources of energy. Nonetheless, the future use of
EVs, or any transportation medium for that matter,
are incompatible with the patterns of renewable
energy generation (solar mainly). We mostly use
vehicles during the day, when solar energy
generation is at its peak. However, users charge EVs
at night, when there is none or few alternative
energies production.

This desynchronization between energy supply and

demand is a big challenge, one that's expected to
worsen as we move into an electrified mobility world.
There is an increasing need to develop smart energy
storage plants (i.e., Daimler is already operating two
of them) and bidirectional EV charging schemes (i.e.,
Nissan Leaf testing) that can act as counterpoints to
such antipatterns. These challenges are opening new
opportunities for uprising Deep Tech startups to
disrupt the energy market too (i.e., 24M).

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 3.4. Sustainability
Safety

When it comes to Smart Mobility adoption and especially autonomous vehicles, it's not the legislative
hurdles that are slowing general adoption; it's public opinion. To Uber's fatal accident a year ago, we
need to add Tesla's deadly crash in March of 2019 and the expert's lack of confidence on the latest
version of their Autopilot published in Consumer Reports.

As more companies begin running their autonomous test programs, the risk of a fatal accident will only
go up. It's not only problems with the Artificial Intelligence, but also with the extreme fragility of the
sensory inputs which are easily fooled by hackers and innocents alike.

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 3.4. Sustainability
Safety

In the case of autonomous vehicles,

technology is as vital as the
company's strategy for testing,
insuring, and scaling their cars. The
best example out there comes from
Waymo. Even though they hold the
world record of autonomous miles
driven, they're still extremely
conservative about how fast and
where they trial their vehicles.
They're also being remarkably
prescient and are already exploring
insuring options with next-
generation insurance startups (i.e.
Trov, Avinew).

45
 3.4. Sustainability
Efficiency: The Future of Work
Beyond the new transportation methods, there is a
physical limit to how many people or goods can be
transported between two points. Even with the
increased efficiency provided by disruptive
technologies, there is a necessity to restrict and
reduce transportation, especially of humans.
One of the most significant improvements we can
achieve is to reduce commuting by working from
home. While there are jobs that require to be
physically present, the rise of automation (i.e.,
Amazon Go) or the use of robots (i.e., Fast food
chains), is allowing more people to do their job
remotely.
46
As the global 5G network gets deployed, we’ll
probably see massive improvements in
telepresence applications. To a certain extent,
Virtual Reality (VR) could and will be used as a
business tool to have face to face meetings when
needed. The missing link has always been touch,
but the first serious haptic gear for VR was unveiled
not long ago. With VR headsets turning wireless
already, it’s a matter of time before the same
happens with haptic equipment, closing the circle
and allowing us to have real experiences in VR thus
replacing the need to be face to face in the office.
 3.4. Sustainability
Efficiency: The Future of Work

“Enterprise customers need far more precision and realism than today’s VR
controllers can deliver,” said Joe Michaels, chief revenue officer at Haptx, in a
statement. “Realistic touch is the missing link for many enterprise VR
applications. Haptx Gloves are the first device to bridge this gap.”

“Haptx unveils haptic gloves so you can feel things in VR.” VentureBeat. Oct
2018.
(https://venturebeat.com/2018/10/03/haptx-unveils-haptic-gloves-so-you-can-
feel-things-in-vr/)

Being able to work from home should diminish the need to commute to the
business district, thus reducing the stress on the transportation grid during peak
hours.

No matter what, we’ll always need transportation, but the convergence of better
global data coverage and the increased use of automated vehicles, will free
time from driving and enable workers to work while on the move. This won’t be
massive, but it will help with long commutes from the periphery of cities or even
neighboring cities.

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 3.4. Sustainability
Efficiency: Decentralising the business district

It’s precisely this need to converge over a single

physical spot, called Central Business District, that
forces big swaths of the population into commuting
“With regard to accessibility, the attribute
to the same place, at the same time. While many
level accessibility by car and public transport
cities have not one but several big business
shows the highest part-worth utility. This
districts, not much is being done from an urban
planning perspective to alleviate this problem. result suggests that co-workers have a higher
preference for co-working spaces that are
accessible by both car and public transport.
However, new phenomena, the proliferation of
More specifically, older co-workers (≥ 35
Coworking and Coliving spaces, is aiming at this
years) and managers/board members mainly
exact problem. As more companies begin allowing
their employees to work remotely, the need for a find accessibility by car important, thus they
close-by, well provided and suited working attach less importance to accessibility by
public transport.”
environment is on the rise. This is precisely what
coworking companies are aiming at, with WeWork
“Analysing user preferences for co-working space
being the obvious poster boy.
characteristics.”
Building Research & Information Journal. May
While many of the first coworking spaces selected 2018.
real estate randomly, the next generation is running
serious urban studies to decide which is the ideal (https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/0961321
8.2018.1463750)
location within the city.

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 3.4. Sustainability
Efficiency: Decentralising the business district

The rise of coworking spaces is also triggering the appearance of co-living areas too. These spaces
are a combination of residence building and coworking space. While the number of co-living spaces is
still small, the need for cheap living rents is merging with remote work and the need for a community.
Expect a growing number of apartment buildings to begin merging the frontiers between home and
community space. As weird as this looks like to many, especially older generations, the co-living
solution would reduce drastically, the need for peak-hour commutes, hence reducing stress to the
transport system.

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50
4. 50
AFTERWORD
 4. AFTERWORD

All in all, during the next few years we’re going to see
increased investment in urban planning and design. The
field will become very relevant, and both, proptech, urban-
tech, and smart mobility will converge.

It’s worth asking ourselves what will happen with the

countryside and how or if technology can help retain people
there to prevent massive urbanization of the population. Will
the countryside be the domain of robots, or will humans
reclaim it again? Will cities be resilient enough to take in
most of the population or will multimillion people slums be a
common sight in most mega cities?

Smart Mobility is a very hot space, but its impact and

relevance to our own survival escapes many. Developing or
investing in the industry isn’t about retaining your market
share but about preparing for the future.

Alex Barrera
Editor in Chief at The Aleph Report
Madrid, May 2019

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 This report has been researched, written and designed by The Aleph Report for Spain Startup.

Author: Alex Barrera (The Aleph Report)

Editors: Aranxta Quintana (Spain Startup)

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