Uber reportedly weighs bid for company that owns Citi Bike

There may be a battle brewing over who will buy Motivate, the owner of the Big Apple’s Citi Bike program.

Uber is weighing a bid for the company, according to a report on Friday.

On June 1 it was reported that rival ride-hailing company Lyft was close to a deal to buy the Citi Bike operator — which also runs the Ford GoBike program in Detroit.

The price for Motivate was expected to be above $250 million.

If Uber gets its way, it would be double-dipping in the bike-share market — in April it ponied up almost $200 million for Brooklyn-based Jump, which operates about 425 dockless electric bikes in San Francisco and Washington, DC, and which will be participating in a pilot program in New York City’s outer boroughs this summer.

Uber Chief Executive Dara Khosrowshahi said the Jump acquisition will help Uber go beyond “just being about car sharing and car hailing to really helping the consumer get from A to B in the most affordable, most dependable, most convenient way.”

It’s not yet clear what Uber’s potential purchase of Motivate would mean for its dockless bike efforts — Citi Bike and its 12,000 regular foot-powered bikes have the exclusive right through 2029 to serve most of Manhattan and select parts of Brooklyn and Queens.

Citi Bike, which celebrated its fifth anniversary last month, has provided New Yorkers with 60 million rides since it started in 2013.

Motivate also operates bike-share programs in eight US cities, including San Francisco, Washington and Boston, and reported 3.18 million rides last month.

Axios first reported Uber’s interest in Motivate.

Uber did not immediately respond to a request for comment.