PM Launches 100% Electric Car Share Offering

Prime Minister Launches Southern Hemisphere’s Biggest 100% Electric Car Share Offering

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern launched the Southern Hemisphere’s biggest 100% electric car share offering in Christchurch today

The Southern Hemisphere’s biggest deployment of pure battery electric cars and largest pure EV car sharing model was officially launched in Christchurch today by Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern.

Yoogo Share, a bold new initiative adopted by the Christchurch City Council will see a pure EV fleet of 100 cars, ten hubs and 100 chargers made available around Christchurch. Twelve key businesses with 3,000 drivers are already working with the Yoogo Share cars, removing 115 combustion engine vehicles from their fleets. Membership is now open to private users.

Yoogo CEO David Jenkinson said the technology powering the fleet is very much the future as it provides a cost effective alternative to company cars, rental cars, taxis and even private ownership.

“Imagine landing at Christchurch airport on business, just one minute walk to your Yoogo Share car which you access via your membership card or phone. At less than $15 an hour to drive a new BMW i3 or Hyundai Ioniq – it’s a no brainer,” says Jenkinson.

“While electric vehicles are increasing in popularity, they can be challenging to adopt because of the extra cost of the vehicles, not to mention costs for chargers and installation. Sharing is a great way to enable the benefits of an EV without the hassle or cost.”

With zero tail pipe emissions and less congestion, Yoogo Share will deliver positive health benefits for Christchurch city and contribute to a smarter and renewable city.

Christchurch City Mayor Lianne Dalziel says that sustainability is at the forefront of this initiative.

“Our purpose here today may not have been in any blueprint, but it is as much a part of our regeneration as is any project that was envisaged. It is about who we are as a city – New Zealand’s 21st century Garden City putting sustainability to the fore.”

General Manager Kirsten Corson said that sustainability is also an important part of Yoogo Share’s business.

“Although Yoogo Share is a technology based mobility company, sustainability is important to us and extends beyond our pure EVs and into us contributing to our communities” says Corson.

“We’re working with DOC, supplying natives for planting in the Evans Pass recovery programme between Lyttelton & Sumner.”

In addition to helping Kiwi businesses ‘go green’, the Yoogo Share offering also appeals to millennials, who are increasingly choosing public transport and rideshare services over car ownership.

Canterbury University student Matthew Knight, who has been working closely with Yoogo Share says the idea of having all care no responsibility access to a pure EV has huge appeal to his peer group.

“As a student the last thing you want is to have to fork out for a car that’s going to need costly maintenance. We still want the freedom to get around – and with Yoogo Share we’ve got access to a cool, new and sustainable option that’s more cost effective than taxis or Uber.”

Business and private users simply sign up at www.yoogoshare.co.nz and book a vehicle. Rates are based on the minute, hour, or day, whichever is cheapest.

Users of the service can pick up a car at a Yoogo Share hub. When finished they simply drop it back to the hub and plug it in to charge.

Yoogo Share has active hubs at Christchurch Art Gallery car park, West End car park and Christchurch International Airport, with Fendalton, Papanui, Lyttleton, the University of Canterbury, Ara Institute, The Crossing and The Terrace launching over the coming weeks & months.

Southern Hemisphere's largest 100% electric car-sharing scheme launches in Christchurch

The largest 100 per cent electric car-sharing scheme in the Southern Hemisphere has been wheeled out in Christchurch today.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern helped launch the Yoogo Share initiative that has been adopted by Christchurch City Council and will put a pure EV fleet of 100 cars, 10 hubs and 100 chargers around the rebuilding city.

Twelve key businesses with 3000 drivers are already working with the Yoogo Share cars, and removing 115 combustion engine vehicles from their fleets. 
Membership will open to private users next month.

Users can pick up a car at a Yoogo Share hub and, when finished, drop it back and plug it in to charge.

Yoogo chief executive David Jenkinson said the technology is a cost-effective alternative to company cars, rental cars, taxis and even private ownership.

"Imagine landing at Christchurch airport on business, just one minute walk to your Yoogo Share car, which you access via your membership card or phone. At less than $15 an hour to drive a new BMW i3 or Hyundai Ioniq – it's a no brainer," he said.

"While electric vehicles are increasing in popularity, they can be challenging to adopt because of the extra cost of the vehicles, not to mention costs for chargers and installation. Sharing is a great way to enable the benefits of an EV without the hassle or cost."

In addition to helping Kiwi businesses "go green", the Yoogo Share offering also appeals to millennials, who are increasingly choosing public transport and rideshare services over car ownership.

Canterbury University student Matthew Knight, who has been working closely with Yoogo Share, says the idea of having all care no responsibility access to a pure EV has huge appeal to his peer group.

"As a student the last thing you want is to have to fork out for a car that's going to need costly maintenance," he said.

"We still want the freedom to get around – and with Yoogo Share we've got access to a cool, new and sustainable option that's more cost effective than taxis or Uber."

Yoogo Share has active hubs at Christchurch Art Gallery car park, West End carpark, Christchurch International Airport, Fendalton and Papanui. Lyttelton, the University of Canterbury, Ara Institute, The Crossing and The Terrace will get hubs over the coming weeks and months.

In May last year, Europcar and Volkswagen New Zealand teamed up with Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch airports to offer corporate travellers free electric cars to travel between business meetings.

The keys are collected at the Europcar desk and the cars are picked up from, and dropped back to, prime parking spots outside the terminals.

The initiative was aimed at "normalising" the cutting-edge technology and testing the public's desire to go electric.

New Zealand's first fully battery powered electric car sharing service launched

A Kiwi-first initiative is giving Christchurch businesses and the public access to a pool of 100 electric vehicles.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern officially launched Christchurch's first fully battery powered electric car sharing service at the Christchurch Art Gallery on Thursday. 

The project is run through Yoogo Share, a New Zealand electric car sharing business.

PM Jacinda Ardern and Mayor Lianne Dalziel in one of the new electric share cars.

Mayor Lianne Dalziel said she was proud Christchurch was the first city in New Zealand – and one of the few cities internationally – with such a service.

"This service will deliver improved environmental and health outcomes and help the Council achieve its goal of becoming carbon neutral by 2030."

Ardern said encouraging the use of electric vehicles was an important part of the Government's plan for New Zealand to become carbon neutral by 2050. 

"It's great we could help Christchurch lead the way with this innovative car sharing scheme," she said.

Yoogo Share general manager Kirsten Corson said the company was pleased to be able to open up the car share service to the public.

How electric cars can create the biggest disruption since iPhone

It's 10 years since Apple unleashed a surge of innovation that upended the mobile phone industry.

Electric cars, with a little help from ride-hailing and self-driving technology, could be about to pull the same trick on Big Oil.

The rise of Tesla and its rivals could be turbo-harged by complementary services from Uber Technologies and Alphabet's Waymo unit, just as the iPhone rode the app economy and fast mobile internet to decimate mobile phone giants like Nokia.

The culmination of technologies - autonomous electric cars available on demand - could transform how people travel and confound predictions that battery-powered vehicles will have a limited impact on oil demand in the coming decades.

"Electric cars on their own may not add up to much," David Eyton, head of technology at London-based oil giant BP, said in an interview. "But when you add in car sharing, ride pooling, the numbers can get significantly greater."

Most forecasters see the shift away from oil in transportation as an incremental process guided by slow improvements in the cost and capacity of batteries and progressive tightening of emissions standards.

But big economic shifts are rarely that straightforward, said Tim Harford, the economist behind a book and BBC radio series on historic innovations that disrupted the economy.

"These things are a lot more complicated," he said. Rather than electric motors gradually replacing internal combustion engines within the existing model, there's probably going to be "some degree of systemic change."

That's what happened 10 years ago. The iPhone didn't just offer people a new way to make phone calls; it created an entirely new economy for multibillion-dollar companies like Angry Birds maker Rovio Entertainment or WhatsApp.

The fundamental nature of the mobile phone business changed and incumbents like Nokia and BlackBerry were replaced by Apple and makers of Android handsets like Samsung. Today, as Elon Musk's Tesla and established automakers like General Motors are striving to make their electric cars desirable consumer products, companies like Uber and Lyft are turning transport into an on-demand service and Waymo is testing autonomous vehicles on the streets of California and Arizona.

Combine all three, for example through an Alphabet investment in Lyft, and you have a new model of transport as a service that would be a cheap compelling alternative to traditional car ownership, according to RethinkX, a think tank that analyzes technology-driven disruption.