Car-rental firm couldn’t pay staff for months. Today, it has a 400-strong fleet

Photo credit: Smove

From a one-man show to a car-rental firm with 400 sets of wheels, Smove has had a rough ride since it launched in 2011. A year after its birth, the startup faced financial trouble. It was running out of cash, and the staff slept in the office to save on rent as they had not been paid for four months.

Joseph Ting, Smove’s chief commercial officer, witnessed those tough times. “When Smove first started, the startup scene wasn’t as established as it is today,” he told Tech in Asia. “One major challenge was that we had to create our own business model without any playbooks or templates.”

A former regional marketing manager at Singapore Airlines, Ting joined Smove in 2013, curious about startups and smart mobility. He was drawn to co-founder Tom Lokenvitz’s vision of making cities more livable by providing quick access to vehicles.

The car-sharing economy in Singapore was non-existent then. And as one of the pioneering players in the industry, Smove was a giant leap into the unknown. Ting was a one-man dynamo who managed operations and business development. The startup was made up of four staff members and six electric vehicles at a small locale in the city-state.

“Everyone, including myself, had to clean, fix, and maintain the vehicles while trying to grow the network of locations around Singapore. We were literally working round the clock,” he said.

But the team pressed on, knowing that Singapore’s shift away from private-car ownership will yield great results for Smove’s car-sharing business model.

Pricey wheels

As car sharing was only starting to gain ground, Smove had the flexibility to pivot through various strategies. In 2012, it planned to introduce a network of electric bikes and vehicles for rent, as well as docking stations, throughout Singapore.

The idea was scrapped, and Smove decided on a petrol car fleet. It also did away with its bike-sharing plans – back then, the infrastructure for electric vehicles wasn’t adequate.

Taxis on the move in Singapore / Photo credit: Lily Lvnatikk / Unsplash

Smove finally got its break in 2014, when it secured series A funding worth US$1.1 million led by Rebright Partners, with contributions by 500 Startups and Wavemaker Pacific. The startup now has 60 staff on its team.

“We went through an intense scale-up period where we started expanding rapidly. There were very sharp growing pains in growing so quickly,” said Ting.

He added, “Our fleet went from 20 cars to 200 cars in less than six months and staff strength increased five-fold.” It kept expenses low by partnering with firms who own fleets. As a result, it hasn’t raised new funding since.

Making smart hardware

What’s next for Smove