Uber-backed electric scooter rental company Lime filed to go public on the Nasdaq on Friday, publicly releasing stats on growing gross revenue and ridership. Lime also noted that, without an IPO, it risks going out of business.
Lime’s parent company, Neutron Holdings, would have to refinance its debt, and lists principal payments on loan commitments totaling around USD 845.8 million due within the next 12 months, according to its Form S-1 filing. “We do not currently have sufficient liquidity to repay [lenders],” the company said. “Our ability to continue as a going concern is dependent upon the consummation of our initial public offering.”
It’s not unusual for a company to be unable to repay its loan commitments at maturity. But using an IPO as the primary repayment mechanism puts the company in tricky territory, as underwriters can end up with more leverage on pricing, according to Sebastian Kian, senior private credit research analyst at PitchBook LCD, a Morningstar company.
“The company needs this IPO to address the 2026 maturities, and that dependence is itself a risk,” Kian said. “But if they have a refinancing path and are using the IPO to de-lever instead, that’s constructive,” he added. At the point of the IPO, Lime’s loans, structured as convertible debt, would convert to equity.
Lime took out substantial loans during the zero-interest-rate environment, and those loans are now approaching maturity amid significantly higher interest rates. This situation is now common. Around $85 billion in loan maturities will fall due between 2026 and 2029, putting borrowers under severe refinancing pressure.
To date, Lime is not profitable and has recorded widening net losses of USD 59 million in 2025 from USD 34 million the year prior. At the same time, Lime’s gross revenue grew to USD 886 million from USD 686 million, and its adjusted
Like many of its sharing-economy peers, Lime raised significant venture capital in its heyday, totaling more than USD 1.5 billion since its founding in early 2017. But it struggled with a decline in ridership during the pandemic, and in May 2020, it closed a new financing round at a 78% discount from its previous valuation. Since then, its user base has recovered: Between 2023 and 2025, the company recorded a 40% growth in monthly active users.
Uber UBER, which sold its micromobility arm Jump to Lime, holds a 29% stake in the company. Andreessen Horowitz, which led Lime’s Series A at a USD 42 million valuation, holds a stake of more than 10% in Lime. Neither investor responded to PitchBook’s requests for comment.
Despite the growing popularity of micromobility startups, especially in major urban hubs like New York and London, these companies have struggled to carve out a path to profitability. In 2022, Bolt, the electric scooter company co-founded by Olympian Usain Bolt, folded. Scooter rental startup Bird, which went public in late 2021 by merging with a special-purpose acquisition company at a USD 2.3 billion valuation, filed for bankruptcy just two years later and sold its assets to its lenders.
Lime’s S-1 highlighted some of the industry’s challenges: a crowded sector, high operating costs, significant seasonality in its business, and regulatory risks. Madrid, Paris, and two London boroughs have banned Lime scooters.
