[reeddavid]

I'm curious why the model doesn't work.

I didn't get a chance to use Maven but I loved using ReachNow, Car2Go and LimePod in Seattle before they each shut down.

I would think the biggest strength of free floating car sharing would be the utilization rate of of the vehicles compared to private ownership.

Looking at the vehicle availability maps, it was clear that there were a lot of trips taking place. Of course some cars ended up in low-demand areas, but on average it seemed there was a lot of rental activity.

I am really curious to know what didn't work, from a business model perspective. None of the shutdown announcements have provided any specific details.

[wmichelin]

In San Francisco, I attempted to use their service once, and I recall there being a tiny number of cars in the city, and none of them were anywhere near my home.

[PopeDotNinja]

I used Maven a few times. My biggest complaint was the stupid requirement to unlock the car with Bluetooth. The last time I rented a car, my phone never stayed in sync. I had to reboot my phone everytime I wanted to lock/unlock the car. And you'd better hope your phone doesn't die.

[HeavenFox]

My observation in NYC metro: the idea of car sharing is flawed because turns out most demands are for weekend trips, and on weekdays the cars sit idle, which sorta defeats the purpose of sharing. As a result, if you use cars frequently on the weekends, it's much more convenient and only a bit more expensive to have your own car.

[nostromo]

Apparently they couldn’t raise prices without losing out to Lyft and Uber, and the cars were expensive to service and maintain.

[josefx]

Not surprising, Uber is still raising new funds every year. It is probably impossible to compete with a service that runs on billions of free money.