Scooter startup Bird is reportedly raising $300 million with assistance from financial giant Fidelity

Facebook/Bird

• Bird, the scooter startup, is raising a new $300 million funding round led by Fidelity, Axios reported Wednesday.
• Last month, there were reports that Uber was working on a bid for either Bird or competitor Lime.
• Any buyout proposals, if true, could be complicated by Bird's latest fundraising.

Scooter startup Bird is raising $300 million in an extension of its previous fundraising round led by the financial giant Fidelity, Axios' Kia Kokalitcheva reported Wednesday. The company will likely keep its $2 billion valuation from the previous round.

Throughout 2018, the scooter company expanded at breakneck speed across the United States and now operates in more than 100 cities in the US and Europe, according to its website. Sometimes, however, the company has showed up with little warning, dumping its scooters seemingly overnight on unaware cities, causing headaches for local officials.

This was the case in Palm Springs, California, in December, when the city government ordered the company to cease and desist all operations. Other cities have had similar issues with Bird.

Read more: E-scooters are sending dozens of people to emergency rooms - and the companies appear to have a double standard when it comes to safety

To date, Bird has raised $415 million across four funding rounds, according to CrunchBase.

Late last year, there were reports that Uber was working on a bid for Bird or its closest competitor, Lime. Those appear to have not panned out if Axios' report is true. Uber has previously invested in Lime.

A Bird spokesperson declined to comment, saying the company does not comment on "rumors or speculation." A Fidelity spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Do you know anything about a Bird funding round? Got a tip? Contact this reporter at grapier@businessinsider.com