This Electric Scooter Could Give Your Lungs A Workout...

COVID-19 and the need for social distancing notwithstanding, eco-friendly urban mobility solutions are all the rage these days. Over the years, we’ve seen many iterations of the electric scooter including foldable ones that could fit into your backpack from the likes of Xiaomi to self balancing scooters from Segway. The University of Tokyo has now come up with a very innovative solution for last-mile connectivity: an inflatable electric scooter!

Called POIMO INT032 (POrtable and Inflatable MObility), this electric scooter prototype comes with two wheels up front and two at the rear, an electric motor, battery pack and a handlebar with a wireless controller integrated into it. Everything is detachable for maximum portability. In fact, you can carry the whole thing in your rucksack as it weighs only 5.5kg altogether. Using a portable air pump, you can inflate the thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU) structure to about 6-7 psi. It doubles up as a ‘chassis’ when inflated, and voila! Your electric scooter is ready.

An inflatable ‘chassis’ like this comes with its own set of caveats like stiffness issues. However, since it’s a low-speed electric scooter, it shouldn’t be all that bothersome. While details about the battery, motor or range haven’t been mentioned yet, we could expect a range of about 15km from the production version.

Ryuma Niiyama, one of the creators and the authors of its research papers, says that they intend to make the electric scooter even lighter in the production version. Right now it is ideal for children but there is potential to tweak and make it an alternative to other electric scooters designed for urban mobility. Of course, you might look like a dork on one of these things but considering the eccentricities of Tokyo, you could just look the part. What do you guys think of this?