Lawrence Leuschner was born in 1982 and grew up in the Taunus. As a teenager he sold defective hammocks from his father's Latin America import business at flea markets, then on eBay. In 2004 he co-founded Trade-a-Game, later Rebuy, and left his studies for it.
After a sabbatical in 2017 he travelled for about 18 months, including a drive from Patagonia to Mexico in a VW Bulli. In April 2018 he saw e-scooters in San Diego and brought a workshop-based model to Europe. Tier was founded in Berlin in 2018, only three months after the business plan.
Tier reached 1 million rides in April 2019 and 2 million by June. It raised a €25 million Series A in 2019 and a $250 million round in 2020. In 2021 it became an SE and bought Ford's Spin.
In 2022 about 180 staff were laid off. Spin was sold to Bird for $19 million in 2023. The merger with Dott closed in March 2024, and the Tier app was shut down in October 2024.