Role of cycling, riders' standards vary among global markets: experts
Major online bike-sharing startups based in China are eagerly venturing abroad, even though challenges remain in areas such as localization and risk management, industry insiders said on Thursday.
Bike-sharing providers such as Mobike, Ofo and Bluegogo are actively testing the waters in overseas markets after launching international strategies earlier this year.
In March, Mobike started business in Singapore, its first overseas hub, and it will expand into other international cities this year, the company said on March 21.
Ofo has also stepped up efforts to internationalize. Currently, Ofo is operating in 100 cities globally in markets including the US, the UK and Singapore, with a total of 5 million bicycles in use and 100 million registered users, according to a document the firm sent to the Global Times earlier this month.
"The overall goal for Ofo is to enter 20 countries and regions around the world," Senior Vice-president Nan Nan told a press conference at the company's contractor factory in North China's Tianjin Municipality on Friday.
Ofo signed a cooperation agreement in May with Shanghai-based bicycle producer Phoenix, which has been making bikes for 120 years and has registered trademarks in more than 80 countries.
Based on Phoenix's advantages in brand recognition and exports, Ofo hopes to expand overseas in partnership with the bicycle maker, the document said.
Bluegogo has also been exploring the overseas market. Its first international site is Los Angeles, which the company entered in January. "Our bikes are mainly made in China and transported to the US by ship in large numbers at a relatively low cost," Hu Yufei, vice president of Bluegogo, told the Global Times on Thursday.
"We will pay more attention to Asian and North American cities as our next steps," Hu said.
But the success of the bike-sharing providers in the domestic market, which can be attributed to a combination of factors, may not be easily replicated when going overseas, a representative from the China Bicycle Association, who preferred not to be identified, told the Global Times on Thursday.
"Different roles of shared bikes will influence how the rental business develops in the overseas markets," she said.
In China, shared bikes are mainly treated as travel tools and their most practical function is to solve the "last mile" problem, she said, noting that a similar market has emerged in the UK, where bicycles are regarded as a complement to mass transit and the bicycle industry has been encouraged to develop in recent years.
But in some European countries such as Germany, bikes are usually used for leisure and fitness, while in Denmark and Holland - where bicycle culture is deeply rooted - bikers have higher standards for their machines, she noted.
"The specific conditions of target markets, such as bicycles' penetration rates, should be considered when the industry seeks to go abroad. It's also important to comply with local policies," Liu Dingding, a Beijing-based independent industry analyst, told the Global Times on Thursday.
For example, there might be better prospects in the more populated markets in Southeast Asia, where the "last mile" problem needs to be solved, Liu said.
Besides, as the sharing concept is closed related to Internet use, bike-sharing companies need to encourage riders to use their apps, whose acceptance ratios are not high overseas, Liu added.
Digital payments, another product of the Internet, may also pose an obstacle for bike providers as they seek to expand abroad. For example, "In France where mobile payments are not popular, people tend to pay rental fees for shared bikes by credit cards instead of phones," Long Yumeng, a 30-year-old white-collar worker who has lived in Paris for three years, told the Global Times on Thursday.
Liu also has a warning: The industry has been developing faster than the ability and risk awareness of most of its top executives.
