Glad to announce that GoMore has acquired peer-to-peer carsharing platform Getaround, resulting in the creation of the largest European actor in this sector.

When I founded Amovens at 24 (very vintage photo below ☺️), without any business or tech background, I could have hardly imagined this sort of outcome.

Amovens was originally the first large-scale ridesharing platform in Spain, but soon faced fierce competition. I didn’t manage to raise much capital and our market share would steadily diminuish. Things were not looking good. At one point, we were close to selling the company at a very low valuation – but we persisted.

In 2015, we ended up merging with GoMore, which, looking back, could seem a bit odd: two very small companies, operating respectively in Spain and in Denmark, transitioning from ridesharing to P2P car-rental, under one umbrella.

In the meantime, companies in the shared mobility sector raised hundreds of millions of euros. GetAround, an American company, acquired Drivy in France for $300 million. GoMore-Amovens raised much more modest amounts but continued growing fast, but “reasonably”, and ended up acquiring the former.

I deserve zero credit for today’s transaction, as I’ve left operations at Amovens in 2017 and GoMore’s board over 5 years ago, but wish to congratulate Matias Møl Dalsgaard and the whole GoMore-Amovens team.

Here are 3 thoughts derived from this experience:

➊ While I am very critical of the paradigm that currently prevails in tech, I strongly believe that it is possible to build great models thanks to digital technology.

GoMore/Amovens gets past all the filters that I consider we should apply to any tech product:
- It is not based on the exploitation of our attention or our data.
- It is not addictive.
- Its business model is aligned with the value it brings to its users, while generating positive externalities to the whole society, by reducing the dependance on car ownership.

➋ Raising hundreds of millions –or billions– to pursue exponential growth, as we’re seeing in many AI companies at the moment, can be very shiny, but it’s also part of an accelerationist mindset, which can prove improductive. To the contrary, it sometimes pays off keeping your feet on the ground and consider business more wisely.

➌ Business is not my primary occupation today. However, I wouldn’t be able to do what I’m doing now without my experience at Amovens, which has allowed me:
➤ Gaining first-hand insights into some dynamics that operate in the tech industry, which I couldn’t have learnt from books.
➤ Learning how to build an organisation, even if the Movimiento OFF, which is my primary focus, is a non-profit.
➤ Reinvesting some of the funds of my partial exits into the OFF Movement, to address what I consider one of the primary challenges our humanity is currently facing.