Lime, the American electric bicycle startup with Uber as an investor, has filed for an initial public offering (IPO) on the Nasdaq in the United States. Neutron Holdings, the company's parent company, filed the form on Friday, May 8, according to the Financial Times .
The company, which will trade on the stock exchange under the ticker symbol LIME, aims to reach a market value of US$2 billion. Before the Covid-19 pandemic, the company had a valuation of US$2.4 billion.
In Brazil, the company began operations in July 2019, just before the period of social isolation, but initially as an electric scooter rental service in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro.
The arrival coincided with the entry of other groups responsible for electric scooter and bike rental operations, such as Green and Yellow, which began to have equipment in several cities in Brazil.
However, six months later, in January 2020, Lime announced it was leaving Brazilian cities, citing the pursuit of "financial sustainability."
At the time, the company also ceased operations in ten other cities worldwide, including Buenos Aires, Lima, and Montevideo, laying off approximately 100 employees. Today, the company operates in 250 cities across 31 countries, mostly in Europe and the United States. Its only current location in Latin America is Santiago, Chile.
According to the company's document, Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase are the main banks responsible for underwriting the IPO. This move could mark a turning point for Lime and the entire micromobility sector, which has struggled to overcome local regulatory challenges and the difficulty of attracting investors. Most of these companies operate at a loss.
Bird, an American operator and competitor of Lime, filed for bankruptcy in 2023 after suffering financial losses. The company was once valued at over US$2 billion.
Lime's most recent annual results, disclosed in its Nasdaq prospectus, showed that its revenue grew 29% year-over-year, reaching $886 million in 2025, but its loss increased 75% to $59.3 million over the same period.
The company has posted positive free cash flow for the past three years, generating $103.8 million in 2025, and its gross margin improved from 32.4% in 2023 to 39% last year.
However, Lime warned that it has been accumulating net losses every year since its creation in 2017, and that the company may "not be able to achieve or maintain profitability in the future." It also said that its expenses will "likely increase" as it expands into new cities and invests more in marketing.
The group, whose CEO is former Uber executive Wayne Ting, is now seeking to recover after the pandemic, when services were severely reduced and the company was forced to suspend trips in many countries, including the Brazilian market.
In May 2020, Lime raised $170 million, with a valuation of $510 million. The round was led by Uber and had the support of Alphabet and Bain Capital.
This amount represented a significant drop compared to the 2019 funding round, when the company raised US$310 million and reached a valuation of US$2.4 billion.
The 2020 agreement also included the acquisition of Jump, Uber's electric bike and scooter division. According to the document, Uber owns more than 10% of Lime.
The integration between the companies, which allows Lime vehicles to be rented through the Uber app, accounted for approximately 14% of Lime's total revenue last year. According to the document, the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz is the second-largest shareholder in Lime, after Uber, with a stake exceeding 5%.
“Lime was founded on a simple yet radical idea: people and cities deserve a future where transportation is shared, accessible, and carbon-free,” Ting wrote in a letter included in the IPO prospectus.
Globally, the company competes with several startups, such as the European companies Voi and Dott, and the British company Forest. It also competes with Motivate, from the Lyft transportation platform, which operates the Citi Bike service in New York.
