š Essential City + Tech Stories: 2.1.21
Homelessness Counts, Vaccine Distribution's Last-Mile Challenge, and News from Micromobility World
Hello! Happy Monday. I hope the first week of February is going well for you. š
A couple of notes before diving in: I want to quickly acknowledge that I didn't end up publishing a podcast episode over the weekend.
The experiment that I'm trying with pod didn't quite feel ready, so I decided to hold hitting send until I thought it was up to par. More details to come in a few days!
Thank you to theĀ 11 readersĀ who booked time on my calendar to chat cities and tech! To prepare for some big projects, I want to catch up with as many of you as possible. So please, if you have any thoughts on cities and tech, book some time on my calendar.
As UT continues growing, we are starting to get more shoutouts in other media spots. Iāve included a few recent mentions below ā go follow them for intelligent analysis on the wide world of cities.
Podcast Mention: The Digital Metropolis Podcast, hosted by journalistĀ Roman Shemakov, gave us a quick shoutout at the top of theirĀ recent podcast.
Newsletter Mention:Ā Urban Tech friendĀ Danial Naqvi recently decided to get into the city newsletter game with the launch ofĀ CityRiffs. Danialās format is a new spin on newsletters that I havenāt seen. He gave me the chance to share a few thoughts on cities for the first edition:
Last Mondayās most popular stories:
š„ Initialized Capital: [DATA] Post-Pandemic Silicon Valley Isnāt A Place
š„Protocol: Building a VC firm on content and community
š„ CityLab: Another New Spin on UBI: Pay Black Entrepreneurs
Essential City + Tech Stories: 2.1.21
šØ Axios Today: Podcast: How states are dealing with vaccine distribution
š The New York Times:How Many Americans Are Homeless? No One Knows
šø Bloomberg: SoftBank to Invest $100 Million in Miami Area Companies
š Axios: Biden's tricky EV buying plan
š¤ TechCrunch: Fetchās latest warehouse robot is designed to replace forklifts
Axios Today: Podcast: How states are dealing with vaccine distribution
With vaccine distribution ramping quickly, we are in the midst of arguably the largest logistic problem in human history.
This Axios Today Podcast episode from last week reminded me of the scale of the logistics problem in front of the Biden team:
The Biden administration has a goal of 100 million coronavirus vaccinations in the first 100 days. That's a big number logistically, but many experts say it isn't enough. The federal government can mandate a vaccine rollout like this, but it's up to the states on how to execute it.
The New York Times: How Many Americans Are Homeless? No One Knows
Homeless counts are critical for determining the allocation of government resources. Similar to how the census at a macro level is used for allocating government resources effectively.
Last week,Ā The New York Times Editorial BoardĀ published a piece explaining some context around the problem.
Many Americans imagine that the homeless are mostly people who made bad choices. They imagine the homeless are mostly single men. They imagine the government is trying to end homelessness.
The government pretends that the problem is smaller than it actually is. It estimated last year that nearly 568,000 Americans were homeless in January 2019. That figure is not just badly out of date. It was clearly wrong at the time, too.
We donāt know exactly how many people are homeless in America. We donāt even have a particularly good guess. But the federal estimate relies on local one-night-only head counts of the homeless population, conducted at the end of January, that seem almost designed to produce an undercount. A federal audit recently described the method as unreliable, which means that the governmentās ignorance is impeding efforts to provide necessary aid to people in desperate need.
Bloomberg: SoftBank to Invest $100 Million in Miami Area Companies
Venture/tech money continues to pour into Miami. Jonathan Levin and Sarah McBride explained the news:
SoftBank Group Corp.Ā committed $100 million in funding for companies in the Miami area, bolstering a beach-side metropolis that has been aggressively courting the technology industry in recent months.
The money will go toward businesses based in Miami or ones that are relocating to the region, said Marcelo Claure, the Miami-based chief operating officer at SoftBank. Claure introduced the pledge in an online video Thursday alongside Miami Mayor Francis Suarez. āPeople want to move here because they have the choice, and the next thing they need is capital,ā Claure said.
The investments will come from existing SoftBank funds, such as the companyās $5 billion Latin America vehicle, said a person familiar with the matter.
Axios: Biden's tricky EV buying plan
On multiple fronts, the Biden administration looks at ambitious climate proposals, including major plans to help spur EV transition.
AsĀ Joann MullerĀ points out, there are significant political challenges ahead.
Axios' Joann Muller reportsĀ that Biden's plan to replace the governmentās fleet of 650,000 cars and trucks with electric vehicles assembled in the U.S. by union workers is easier said than done.
Why it matters:Ā The populist "Buy American" message sounds good. But the vehicles Biden wants are still several years away and his purchase criteria would require an expensive overhaul of automakers' manufacturing strategies.
It would also require a reversal of fortune for labor organizers long stymied by Tesla and other non-union companies.
Reality check:Ā Right now, not a single model fit his criteria: battery-powered, made in America, by union workers.
TechCrunch: Fetchās latest warehouse robot is designed to replace forklifts
Editorās note: Before leaving my job working as a communications consultant last Summer, Fetch Robotics was a client that I worked on directly.
Safety is one of the biggest concerns in the logistics industry.Ā Fetch Robotics, a platform forĀ autonomous mobile robots, is helping remove one of the most dangerous parts of the equation ā forklifts.
San Jose-based robotics company Fetch unveiled its latest robot this morning. The PalletTransport1500 is an autonomous bot designed specifically to replace forklift uses in warehouses. The systems, which are designed to pick up and deliver pallets, are capable of sporting payloads of up to 2,504 pounds.
The device joins a number of different robotic forklift solutions from various companies, including Toyota. Though Amazonās own Kiva Systems-produced robots are likely still the best-known pallet-moving robotics in the game.
The system was developed with Honeywell Intelligratedās Momentum warehouse software. Fetch, of course, already offers a number of different warehouse robotic solutions, building out a kind of autonomous ecosystem. The companyās systems are notable for their relative flexibility over other full-scale solutions.
Several Interesting Social PostsĀ
Micromobility World News Roundup š“ šµ š²
Last week, the micromobility experts and operators gathered virtually to the state of the industry. Hosted byĀ Micromobility Industries, leading operators, investors, executives, media, policymakers, were a part of the conversation. Like any major industry event, a lot of news came out of the show.
Here are two stories that stuck out to me:
The Washington Post: Fordās Spin wants to curb e-scooter dumping with remote-controlled three-wheelers
TechCrunch: Lime adds shared electric mopeds to the mix
Thanks for reading today's edition! A quick reminder: Thursday's edition will feature my conversation with former New York City Deputy MayorĀ Cas Holloway. In 2019, Cas joined a startup calledĀ UnqorkĀ as its head of public enterprise.
His work at Unqork focuses on advising local governments to make communication with communities more affordable and efficient. Because of the budget constraints that local governments face, the IT landscape is incredibly fragmented and inefficient.
UnqorkĀ comes in and builds on top of these legacy systems to help governments digitize services efficiently. You're going to learn a lot from Cas.
Talk on Thursday!
āļøJT