Disrupting mobility was not always on Euwyn Poon’s mind. After all, the Cornell University and Cornell Law School graduate was on track to become an attorney at Simpson Thacher & Bartlett, where he served as a mergers and acquisitions associate. 

In 2010, the startup bug bit him and he took a leap into the unknown, leaving his corporate job for his first venture out of Y Combinator, Opzi. However, it was only several years later, did the 35-year-old gain traction at a micromobility start-up named Spin. In two years since its launch, the electric scooter company was acquired by Ford for US$100 million.

Today, Spin is present in approximately 70 markets around the world and counts itself as one of the leaders in the micromobility space, among close rivals such as Lime and Bird. I caught up with the co-founder and president to find out about how he scaled Spin from its initial launch in Seattle, Washington while navigating the complex labyrinth of city government regulation, and his journey of becoming a successful entrepreneur. 

High Net Worth: You have quite an interesting resume I must say. But what drove you from a cushy corporate job to the world of start-ups? 

Euwyn Poon: I enjoyed law school and practising at Simpson Thacher & Barlett. However, I’ve always been more of an entrepreneur, engineer and designer. I spent much of my time in high school building apps, then studied computer science at Cornell. I’m driven by building products that can improve lives on a large scale and creating brands that can garner global reach. Even though I started as a lawyer, it was always only a matter of time before I went into the start-up world. In 2009, not long after picking up a copy of Founders at Work by Y Combinator co-founder Jessica Livingston, which recounted stories of some legendary start-ups like Paypal and Hotmail, I headed out west to crash on a friend’s couch in San Mateo. Thereafter, I interviewed and got accepted into one of the early batches of Y Combinator.

How was your experience at Y Combinator? And did it help when it came to fundraising?

Y Combinator was an incredible experience. Paul Graham and team are great mentors. My fondest memories of Silicon Valley were at 320 Pioneer Way, the first YC headquarters. I had no prior network in Silicon Valley, and YC was directly responsible for introducing me to all my early investors, even prior to the first Demo Day.

There is a proliferation of other shared mobility start-ups around. What made you venture into this space, considering that there is so much competition from bike-sharing and car-sharing companies in San Francisco?

Spin was actually the first shared micromobility startup in North America. I drew initial inspiration from a new breed of “stationless” bikeshare companies that grew popular in China right around 2016. While there were station-based bikeshare companies in cities like New York and London, their utility was limited by the fact that you could only pick up and drop off from specific locations. Stationless systems provided the freedom for riders to go where they wanted; a fairly critical feature for a mobility system. I lived in San Francisco when Uber first launched, and saw first-hand how much of an improvement that was over the existing taxi system. However, as Uber became mainstream, I still found rides too expensive and wait times too long for short trips. I had that in the back of my mind when I came across the stationless bikeshare concept and realised this solution was going to make sense in many cities around the world.

I understand that you have two other co-founders. What are you in charge of specifically in the company?

We manage different teams at Spin today. But prior to that, I concepted the company, led the financing early on and built the initial team.  

Was the acquisition by Ford a 100 per cent buyout? Do you and your co-founders still have equity in the Spin?

Spin is currently a wholly-owned subsidiary of Ford.

Would you have preferred to grow the company with venture capital, all the way to an IPO?

Our initial discussions with Ford were in the context of an investment, but the more we learnt about Bill Ford’s vision for the future and our shared commitment to partner with cities and sustainability, the more it made sense to join efforts and scale Spin together. It’s been a great partnership to date as we’ve scaled the company from a couple dozen folks and a handful of markets to over 500 team members across the US and Europe.

How did you increase your user base?

Obtaining permits has given the right for us to operate, and from there, our users generally discover our scooters on the streets or by word of mouth. At the moment, I’m simply focused on bringing Spin to new cities and building the best product possible for our users.

What is Spin’s business model? 

Spin charges users on a per-minute basis to ride our scooters.

Throughout your journey as an entrepreneur, what important lessons have you learnt so far?

Building the right team, from founders to early team members, investors and advisors, is critical to success. A company is just a collection of people sharing a common motivation, and when there is a strong alignment between them and the market, incredible things can happen very quickly.  

What is your favourite metaphor for describing entrepreneurship?

Starting a company is akin to jumping out of an airplane and assembling your parachute on the way down. There are big risks involved, but you get a great sense of satisfaction when you’re able to achieve product-market fit with an amazing team.

As someone who dabbles in a variety of businesses, what makes a new venture worthwhile pursuing? 

I have explored different business ideas in the past, but I keep my primary active focus on the biggest opportunity at hand. Like many venture investors, I think about a business’s total addressable market in sizing up its potential. 

With the current climate in mind, what do you see as the next big thing on the horizon?

The global pandemic has changed our day-to-day dramatically. The new habits and norms that people are forming will undoubtedly make room for new products. In mobility, we are witnessing a dramatic increase in ridership of bikes and scooters as people are getting used to other options besides rideshare and cars.