Electric scooter sharing system is a shared transportation service, in which electric scooters (also known as electric scooters) can be used for short-term leasing. Electric scooters are usually dockless, which means they do not have a fixed parking spot and can be operated for parking and pick-up from any location in the service area.

In 2012, Scoot Networks released a light motorcycle style vehicle that could provide short range rental services for scooters. In 2017, Bird and Lime launched a pileless electric scooter. Since its launch in Santa Monica, California, Bird has expanded its services to over 100 cities and reached a valuation of $2 billion in 2018. In the same year, Lime accumulated over 11.5 million rides. The largest shared mobility companies in the United States, Lyft and Uber, launched their own electric scooter sharing service in 2018. By 2030, the global electric scooter market is expected to reach $300 billion to $500 billion.

However, the so-called "no dock" may cause some problems during operation. The most critical issue is managing costs. Not only do operators need to hire manpower to manually charge or replace batteries of electric scooters, but the city government is also troubled by the impact of randomly discarded electric scooters on the city's appearance. Therefore, many cities are attempting to restrict the deployment of electric scooters without piles.

From the perspective of urban management, the goal is to enable all citizens to use green public transportation, and you need to ensure that these people can use electric scooters, so parking posts are the most direct way to ensure this goal is achieved.

Therefore, many companies are developing parking piles for electric scooters, and naturally, these parking piles should be designed to charge the electric scooter when it is parked.

We see it in Europe and North America; Developers use a contact based charging method in the design of parking piles. Kuhmute, Duckt, and Knotcity are among the suppliers.

On the contrary, in South Korea, we have seen different methods. LG, the second largest electronics supplier, announced the launch of a non-contact charging dock suitable for electric scooters. At least two other suppliers are currently engaged in the design and deployment of non-contact charging bases for electric scooters in South Korea.

We believe that electric scooter charging stations will repeat the history of mobile phone charging: initially, contact charging was applied to some mobile phone models, but today mainstream mobile phone models are equipped with non-contact (wireless) charging function.

Reliability is the main reason why non-contact charging (i.e. wireless charging) replaces contact charging (i.e. wired charging). Charging is a very daily operation, and repeated disassembly and touch processes make it easy for the contact point to malfunction after a period of time. On the contrary, due to everything being well sealed, non-contact wireless charging can maintain a reliable charging experience for a long period of time.

It seems that non-contact charging is better than contact charging. In addition to reliability, non-contact charging can continue even if the electric scooter is not parked well on the charging station. However, non-contact charging is more expensive than contact charging. The following figure is a comparison between non-contact charging and contact charging. Additional DC-AC blocks are required on the dock side, and additional AC-DC blocks are required on the vehicle side. Sealed coils replace exposed contact points. The increased costs have made developers and operators unwilling to apply non-contact charging to their charging station designs.