Autolib'

Autolib' was an electric car sharing service which was inaugurated in Paris, France, in December 2011. It closed on 31 July 2018. It was operated by the Bolloré industry and complemented the city's bike sharing system, Velib', which was set up in 2007. The Autolib' service maintained a fleet of all-electric Bolloré Bluecars for public use on a paid subscription basis, employing a citywide network of parking and charging stations. , 3,980 Bluecars had been registered for the service and had more than 126,900 registered subscribers; Autolib' furthermore offered 1,084 electric car stations in Paris agglomeration with 5,935 charging points.

Since beginning operations in Paris, Autolib' expanded its business to the cities of Lyon and Bordeaux. Bolloré also signed deals to begin operating offshoots of Autolib' in London and Indianapolis in 2015, Turin in 2016 and Singapore in 2017.

History

The Autolib' system was a follow-up to Paris' successful Velib' bike sharing system, which began operations in 2007. The system's electric cars were supplied by the Bolloré industrial group, as the result of a collaboration with the Italian automotive firm Pininfarina. There were also plans to integrate payment for the bicycle and car hire services with the ticketing systems for traditional modes of public transport. In May 2012, Vincent Bolloré, the head of the Bolloré group, stated that he expected Autolib' to become profitable by 2018, but the service ended on 31 July 2018 and was replaced on 2 December 2018 by a municipal service to manage the 1000 electrical charging stations in Paris and the City of Paris concluded agreements with several carsharing societies: three freefloating operators and four additional ones participating to the new service Mobilib'.

Construction of the Autolib' stations began in mid-2011, and 66 of the Bolloré Bluecars were deployed for a two-month preliminary trial period between October and December 2011. The system entered service on 5 December 2011, with an initial fleet of 250 Bluecars and 250 Autolib' rental stations serving the city of Paris and 18 surrounding communities (96 in 2016), grouped into the syndicate of associated collectivities "Autolib' Métropole".

At its inception, car availability was a problematic issue, as more Parisians than expected subscribed to the service. Moreover, by early January 2012, up to 40 of the 250 cars in the initial fleet had been temporarily withdrawn from service to repair vandalism or malfunctions.

By July 2012, 650 parking and charging stations had been deployed around Paris and the 46 communes participating in the service, and by February 2013 there were 4,000 charging points. The program's user base grew from 6,000 subscribers at the end of December 2011 to 27,000 in July 2012, and reached 37,000 by early October 2012, of which 13,000 had an annual subscription.

During 2012, sales of electric cars in France were led by the Bolloré Bluecar deployed for Autolib', with 1,543 units registered, representing 28% of total all-electric cars registered in the country that year. Over 2,000 Bolloré Bluecars had been registered for Autolib' by September 2013. By late September 2012, Autolib's fleet reached the milestone of 500,000 rentals since its launch, and its vehicles had been driven a cumulative total of by February 2013. By mid-October 2013, the service had provided over 3 million rentals, with an average of 10,000 rentals per day. By July 2014, Autolib' had 2,500 operational vehicles and over 150,000 subscribers, and its cars had covered a cumulative mileage of over since the service's introduction. In July 2018 the service ceased to operate. Some cars that were part of the fleet are parked in Loir-et-Cher, near Romorantin.

Name lawsuit

In December 2009, the car-rental company Europcar brought the City of Paris to court, arguing that the Autolib' name was a plagiarism and unfair competition