Alan Mond was on his way to
Ann Arbor SPARK's Entrepreneurs Boot Camp when serendipity hit him. Actually, it drove by him.
Mond was working on growing his other startup,
1000 Tools, at the boot camp. 1000 Tools is based in the sharing economy where people who own expensive or niche tools can put them up as rentable online. Mond was trying to think of other market segments he could grow 1000 Tools when a municipal heavy truck rumbled by hauling a big piece of machinery.
"It just popped into my head," Mond says. "What about municipalities? They have a lot of unused equipment."
That’s how
MuniRent got its start three months ago. The Ann Arbor-based startup helps local municipalities put their heavy or niche equipment up for rent to other nearby municipalities. Mond recently signed up the
city of Milan to the service and is working on getting another 20 municipalities in the Ann Arbor area and Oakland County to sign on.
Mond points out that large cities like Ann Arbor often have a fleet of heavy construction equipment that spend large amounts of time sitting idle in work yards and warehouses. He adds that small municipalities often can’t afford to own a fleet of heavy equipment and have to rent it at a premium from traditional commercial rental houses.
"We thought why don't we fill the gap for these municipalities," Mond says. "The idea is to have every municipality in Michigan to have access to this large pool of equipment we have paid for as taxpayers."
Mond currently has one city signed up. He aims to have half a dozen using the service by July and 20 by the end of the year.
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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