MM Technologies Open Letter
Date: February 1st 2018
Mr. Ron Nirenberg Mayor
San Antonio, Texas
City of San Antonio
Council Members
City Manager
City Attorney
Open letter:
As many of you may know, MM Technologies, LLC is a recently founded local company based in San Antonio, Texas, and our principal mission is to provide executive transportation and personalized chauffeur services.
We are a couple of entrepreneurs dealing with burdensome regulations that have kept us out of entering and ultimately starting operations in our town, while they have entrenched the existent Limousine companies providing similar services in a comfortable environment with little or nonexistent competition. Despite the fact that we are part of a the minority because our national origin, MM Technologies keeps distances from any kind of political ideology and recognizes only the true values of the free enterprises and market that made our nation strong since its foundation.
Limousine/Executive Transportation it is simply an exclusive service that operates in a very specific niche of the market that not necessarily needs government protection. During decades municipalities around the world have regulated their local transportation services, provided by either public or private entities with the sacred excuse that by restraining the amount of players, it ensures the success of the selected ones, wishing it could guarantee sustained services for the entire communities.
Not encouraging the innovation, because the lack of competition as a result of these regulations, is a failed practice, and every study done about this matter, shows us what disastrous it could be for local and national economies. It was until the entrance of Rideshare Firms that found a hole in the equation and demonstrated the failure of such policies, that we realized that the Owner Operator figure will be determinant in the future of the Transportation Industry.
Like we stated before in our latest letter MM Technologies, agrees with the method used by the City of San Antonio to determine the capacity of individuals or companies aspiring to launch operations in the local Limousine/Executive Transportation Industry, requiring a complex and extensive process of application, where The Director of GTU altogether with his specialists would determine the ability and integrity of those applicants.
Achieved these requirements MM Technologies entered in the final part of the process as far as July 2017 when our application was approved, and we found ourselves ready to launch with Two Luxury SUVs Cadillac Escalade Platinum Edition purchased in compliance with the [model year and mileage requirements] 8 months later our investment is at risk because we have not started operations due the [vehicle type stretch requirement], and now the model year and the mileage requirements have put our vehicles out of consideration like a vicious circle of misery.
Being frustrated by the complexity of requirements related to the ownership and [Type of Vehicles] that require 3 Vehicles minimum and a vehicle type stretch in the fleet, we decided to formally request a revision of the ordinance (Chapter 33) because we consider it constitutes a well planned barrier to ensure small business will not enter to the local market ever. The initial amount of the investment required to operate a local small Limo company surpasses the 100 K dollars and we are not including here the investment needed to own and maintain a vehicle type stretch that is old-fashioned and it is incapable to generate profits on this days.
MM Technologies operates outside the limits of the City of San Antonio to stay in full compliance with the local law. Even though we cannot operate in our city we were able to increase our numbers up to 642% the very first year of operations. We have planned to work with Drone Photographic specialists, Security Escort services, and to develop our own native app, and all of these dreams remain unachievable until the leaders and law makers of San Antonio realize that there are unfair regulations in place today.
We are not begging for favoritism or any kind of protectionism here, we simply demand that our local leaders take action based in common sense and remove all these burdensome requirements acting according the majority interests:
• Reduce the minimum amount of vehicles required to operate as a Limo to 2 Luxury Vehicles only.
• Grant permission to the Director of GTU to determine vehicles age and mileage eligibility under his department discretion once inspected.
• Remove the requirement that regulate the way we must conduct our business that establishes to operate on a pre-arranged basis only.
Your fellow neighbors,
Miguel Angel Deugarte Michael Rojas V
Founder and President Founder and Vice-President
MM Technologies, LLC MM Technologies, LLC