The company, which already offers a car-hailing service which competes with taxis in Madrid, said it distributed 566 of the electric scooters in the Spanish capital, where they will compete with a dockless electric bicycle sharing scheme.

People can locate a scooter via its app or maps and then ride it by paying a one euro unlocking fee plus riding costs of 0.12 euro per minute, it added in a statement.

“Uber picks Madrid for the first launch in Europe of Jump by Uber, its electric scooter service. Users in that capital have since today a new alternative to move around,” the statement said.

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Madrid city hall has authorised a total of 22 companies to provide shared electric scooters, part of its push to encourage more environmentally-friendly forms of transportation. and cut air pollution. It will allow a maximum of 10,000 electric scooters to be distributed across the city of some 3.2 million residents.

Uber already provides electic scooters for rent in several cities in the United States.   

Several European cities have in recent months introduced restrictions on the use of electric scooters to reduce the threat to pedestrians.

Paris earlier this month introduced fines for riding on sidewalks with electric scooters while Barcelona, Spain's second-largest city, has banned the use shared electric scooters.