MuniRent, the startup that enables municipalities to share heavy equipment, has been gaining traction with some local governments in its first year, but it's finding a lot of easy target clients in Oregon.
MuniRent has landed the cities of Chelsea and Milan as clients and is in the process of signing up Washtenaw County, Ypsilanti, and a handful of municipalities in Macomb and Oakland counties. However, it's starting to appear that the startup's easiest opportunities are in the northwestern section of the U.S.
"There is a lot of action in Michigan but the biggest concentration (of municipalities open to MuniRent's idea of sharing heavy equipment) is in Oregon," says Alan Mond, co-founder of
MuniRent. "Oregon has been doing this since 1995 but they were using Excel spreadsheets."
MuniRent launched out of
1000 Tools last year, which is based in the sharing economy where people who own expensive or niche tools can put them up as rentable online. MuniRent is now 1000 Tools primary product, enabling local municipalities to put their heavy or niche equipment up for rent to other nearby municipalities.
The three-person startup has spent its first year getting the company established in Metro Detroit, and it also got tipped off to Oregon's affinity for the idea recently. MuniRent also won a place in
Code for America’s 2014 accelerator class. About 120 companies applied to take part in the four-month-long program, which takes place in San Francisco, and MuniRent was one of five (and the only one from the Midwest) to make the cut.
"We were pretty flattered to be selected," Mond says. "It's a pretty big deal. They are a growing force in the government tech space."
Source: Alan Mond, co-founder of MuniRent
Writer: Jon Zemke
Read more about Metro Detroit's growing entrepreneurial ecosystem at SEMichiganStartup.com.
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