Segway may have a way to go [Archive]

Casey

11-24-2002, 08:07 AM

quote:Thomas P. Wyman

Segway may have a way to go before it's widely embraced

November 24, 2002

Just in time for the holiday season, Segway hits the retail market.

At $4,950 per copy from Amazon.com. For most people, that kind of jack really busts the toy budget.

Remember Segway? It's that two-wheeled, battery-powered personal transportation device unveiled about a year ago by a noted New Hampshire inventor.

Segway looks a bit like an old-fashioned muscle-powered lawn mower, without the cutting blades.

It carries one standing rider at speeds up to 12 mph, using tilt sensors to tell the electric motor when to go.

At its launch, inventor Dean Kamen touted Segway as a revolutionary device. Urban transportation could be transformed. Corporations and government could adopt it to boost productivity.

Since then, the rhetoric has cooled a bit. "Welcome to the evolution in mobility," the home page of Segway's Web site intones.

Another thing that's cool: the reception to Segway from a couple of potential Indiana customers in Segway's targeted market.

"I don't know how it would be a huge advantage," says Dennis Rosebrough, spokesman for Indianapolis International Airport.

To be sure, shoe leather takes a beating in the walk from concourse to concourse. But that's a problem mostly for passengers. And in the biggest airports, they're herded en masse by people movers and even trains.

The people who work for airports -- administrators, security staff, custodians -- don't actually hoof great distances during the workday, Rosebrough says.

"Who at the airport would use it?" he wonders.

Well then, how about the Indiana Convention Center and RCA Dome? Convention centers, after all, are another market targeted by Segway.

Makes sense. If you start hiking from the east end of the Dome floor after breakfast, you'll reach the western edge of exhibition space in time for lunch. Or it seems that distant, anyway.

But Segway's marketing reach hasn't extended that far yet. Barney Levengood, executive director of the convention center, says diplomatically, "At this point, I would suggest that's not something we've been seeking out."

And for good reason, at least for now, says Paul Saffo, director of the Institute for the Future in Menlo Park, Calif.

The inventor has put a great idea on wheels, he says. But a bulky battery and limited range -- 15 miles or so -- put the brakes on mass use.

Then there's that price.

"Its existence proves we can do it," Saffo says. "But basically it means people with a lot of money can buy one of these things and drive it from power outlet to power outlet while dreaming of the revolution to come."

That statement hints of a rude awakening for secretive inventors who attempt to jump-start demand for a new technology.

Says James Oakley, who teaches marketing at Purdue University, "You may not be able to find a market."

The Segway company didn't respond to a request for sales figures, so it's hard to gauge how that's going.

Give it time, says Art Molella, who directs the Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation at the Smithsonian Institution.

Inventor Kamen, says Molella, "hasn't really tried to market it widely until now."

So cut the price, pump up the power and range, and we may all go along for the ride.