Putting the "oh no" into obikes

[familyguy]

Trip over and injure yourself on stuff put out for clean up and see how fast the council "owns" it.

[mikesbytes]

Trip over and injure yourself on stuff put out for clean up and see how fast the council "owns" it.

Interesting point. If someone steals my bike, leaves it on the pavement and someone trips over it and injures themselves, as the owner of the bike am I legally responsible for the injury?

[human909]

Ownership or goods or property has little to do with it. Responsibility is the simplistic way of describing it.

[Jmuzz]

Interesting point. If someone steals my bike, leaves it on the pavement and someone trips over it and injures themselves, as the owner of the bike am I legally responsible for the injury?

Probably at risk of being dragged into court if the injured person tries it.
Most wouldn't, but there are people around with enough cash and an obsessive nature that it can potentially happen.

Which is why it's a good idea to have a general liability insurance policy so you just pass it off to them to fight.

[Thoglette]

Bike-sharing company oBike's Australian future uncertain after overseas liquidation

...it remains unclear whether the Australian arm of the business will continue to operate.

oBike has not returned calls or emails from the ABC — phone numbers have been disconnected and emails bounce back — but the company told the ABC last month via Facebook it was "not leaving Australia".

The article further notes that it's the data mining and interest on deposits that fuel the business.
And oBike is expanding in Europe, with Italian operations starting. Not the oBike that's been liquidated, of course, (with creditors unlikely to be paid). A completely unrelated, arms-length operation. I'm sure.

[ColinOldnCranky]

Maybe they could have done more, but the cops haven't exactly blamed the victims here.

i can see you love bashing government. Keep at it buddy!

Spot on.

We get the policing resources that we are willing to pay for. It's not the fault of the cop, or even the Commissioner, if they have to ignore a lot of wrongs if they are stretched.

Riders want the cops to do more? Fine. Make the funding of cops a major election determinant and make sure your poly knows it. Whingeing to a special interest group that is not front and centre to the public's attention does not count.

(I'm betting that the EPA has been in unfruitful negotiations with the company for a time. This is just the first time that we have heard about it.)

[antigee]

electric scooter share scheme (Paris) .......

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/ ... me-startup

seen quite a few electric skateboards in Melbourne, very few scooters - not sure on legality?

[biker jk]

Reddy Go is leaving Sydney. Each user can pick up two bikes from their Alexandria depot.

[LateStarter]

And Ofo as well, looks like the fun loving raskley prankstars have won, I hope they don't feel emboldened by their success to turn their attention to vandalising other private property like other obviously abandoned bicycles cluttering footpaths etc, chained up or not.

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/ ... -australia

[Thoglette]

Dockless bike-share service leaves France after ‘mass destruction’ of its fleet

Wrecking bikes has become ‘the new entertainment of underaged individuals,’ the startup says

Hong Kong-based bike-sharing service Gobee is shutting down in France after suffering what the company is calling “mass destruction” of its fleet. Gobee, which had 2,000 bikes in Paris and claimed around 150,000 users across the country, says 3,400 of the company’s bikes have been damaged and more than 1,000 have been stolen, according to The Guardian.

[Thoglette]

Dockless bike firms reveal crackdown on vandalism and dumped bicycles in London

Interestingly, not only is there less OMG (but then the Evening Standard is not 2GB) but the two operators interviewed (Mobike and Ofobike) both seem to be putting a pile of effort into avoiding problems - alarms; geofencing and actual humans checking up on (and rescuing) their bikes

[Calvin27]

Dockless bike firms reveal crackdown on vandalism and dumped bicycles in London

Interestingly, not only is there less OMGosh (but then the Evening Standard is not 2GB) but the two operators interviewed (Mobike and Ofobike) both seem to be putting a pile of effort into avoiding problems - alarms; geofencing and actual humans checking up on (and rescuing) their bikes

It helps when their business model is not to acquire personal data.

[human909]

It helps when their business model is not to acquire personal data.

This keeps getting repeated time and time again with little evidence to back it up. Their business model seems like any other rental business model. Spend money on assets, rent out said assets for income. Like many rental companies they take a security deposit.

Sure some companies probably also make money on the side by selling you personal data. But hey if you don't like it, don't sign up. Same deal with your Australian Bank, Coles or Woolworths...


**This does seem to be an awfully frothy business at the moment with plenty of capital coming out out Asia and rushing head first into various markets. No different from other bubbles.

[Thoglette]

It helps when their business model is not to acquire personal data.

This keeps getting repeated time and time again with little evidence to back it up.

As I said earlier this claim was made by "experts", not me.

But I've long since given up on people clicking through to the cited articles so here's the relevant bit.

Bike-sharing companies make a large portion of their profits by selling users' data to other companies, according to Kim Doh, a senior industry analyst with IBIS World.

"The business model for bike-sharing services has more to do with data mining, advertising and turning a profit for interest on deposits on the bike rental … as opposed to the $2 per 30 minutes they get from the person riding it," she said.

Ms Doh said growing public awareness of data privacy and concern about data breaches made the companies vulnerable.

I'm not sure if I posted the back-of-a-napkin-analysis earlier, but as a first approximation the claim adds up, based on reported claims on the numbers of subscribers and bikes for each player, plus sized of deposit and a nominal user data value.

I'll leave finding that (possible) post or rerunning the calculation as an exercise for the reader

The bikes (as shown by the 2-per-rider offer in Sydney) are sunk (marketing) costs, and not really assets (in the conventional sense). Indeed the EPA in Victoria has shown they can become liabilities.

Ms Doh's final comment indicates that the value of a bike-share business is subject to an additional sovereign risk (in the broadest sense) from countries restricting the collection or resale of the personal data.

[Calvin27]

It helps when their business model is not to acquire personal data.

This keeps getting repeated time and time again with little evidence to back it up.

Just gonna say straight up why are you so defensive of obike? So far you have criticized the police, then the EPA, then generally whole of state government, and then the vandals and then ignored the facts that they have basically abandoned ship with no recourse in Australia and abroad. Surely even you can see that they aren't exactly innocent in ll of this and have done serious damage to new incumbent bike share models and normalising cycling in Australia generally?

[human909]

Yes and my back of the envelope calculations say it really doesn't add up. Lets look at the easy bit first.

"The business model for bike-sharing services has more to do with data mining, advertising and turning a profit for interest on deposits on the bike rental … as opposed to the $2 per 30 minutes they get from the person riding it," she said.

Interest on deposit: $70 * 2.75% = $1.92
30 minutes of riding = $2
So if each sign up only rides for 30minute a year then they already that puts the interest claim into dispute.

As far as data mining goes. How much do you think your data is worth? Do you really think that the companies would have built and deployed 2.35 million in Beijing just for data mining? They can only mine what you give them. There are far easier ways to do so that speeding so much money on physical assets.

Just gonna say straight up why are you so defensive of obike?

Because they have become the whipping boy for a lot of unfair reasons. They've been pushed out of business by vandals and the authorities and then they also get blamed for going out of business by people like you. Do I think O'bike has handled things well? No. But I do find the hypocrisy astounding.

[Calvin27]

Just gonna say straight up why are you so defensive of obike?

Because they have become the whipping boy for a lot of unfair reasons. They've been pushed out of business by vandals and the authorities and then they also get blamed for going out of business by people like you. Do I think O'bike has handled things well? No. But I do find the hypocrisy astounding.

Where did I blame them for going out of business? My blame has solely been on their lack of ownership and management of their assets, I care little for their business. They have pretty much done a james hardie but thankfully bicycles are less harmful than asbestos.

Which part is hypocritical? The EPA enforcing fines when they have had a long track record of no response from an obviously failing business? The police because you expect them to be at the right place at the right time to catch vandals? I think you are using government as whipping boy for simply operating within their remit.

[Thoglette]

Interest on deposit: $70 * 2.75% = $1.92
30 minutes of riding = $2
So if each sign up only rides for 30 minute a year then they already that puts the interest claim into dispute.

Pardon?

The key performance indicator is ratio of subscribed users to bikes provided.

You get deposit interest + one ride + data per user, at least. Say $10 (after costs). Your bikes should be costing well under $100 landed (if Reid can profitably sell bikes for $200), especially if you're buying thousands at a time

Your break-even point is then about 10 subscribers per bike.

And you keep getting interest on the deposits until you liquidate the company due to "cash flow concerns"
( somehow, the equity and deposits got soaked up in executive salaries and "marketing" costs )

I agree that, at $2 a ride, these are not viable long term businesses. Any analysis of the existing "docked" schemes shows that. But "long term viability" is usually not the, ah, "immediate" concern of a me-too start-up trying to get to IPO or the next round of funding.

A quick search will find plenty of commentators explaining why (e.g. Jeffrey Towson
How Hype and Greed Are Ruining Chinese Bike-Sharing (i.e., Mobike and Ofo) ) with the implication that almost all privately run schemes will likely fail.

But savvy investors shouldn't worry: Mickey Fong, EJI Insight reports on A new business model for bike-sharing service which gets rid of the need to actually own those pesky bicycles

As far as data mining goes. How much do you think your data is worth? .

I provided links to industry opinions on that. $10 to $30

[human909]

I agree that, at $2 a ride, these are not viable long term businesses.

That isn't what I said. Nor do I think that is at all true.

A quick search will find plenty of commentators explaining why (e.g. Jeffrey Towson
How Hype and Greed Are Ruining Chinese Bike-Sharing (i.e., Mobike and Ofo) ) with the implication that almost all privately run schemes will likely fail.

So they aren't making a profit? Buttt....

I provided links to industry opinions on that. $10 to $30

With those figures they damn well should be!

I'm sorry but you can have it both ways!

(BTW I think that jefftowson article is quite reasonable and accurate. Can't see much I disagree with there, just it doesn't make sense based on your other picking and choosing of links.)

[Calvin27]

I'm sorry but you can have it both ways!

Of course not. It was a crossroads decision. Obike cannot cash in on the data and successfully keep the bicycle scheme going at the same time.

[Thoglette]

That isn't what I said.

I apologise: I misread your statement.

Hmm $2 might crack it - that's 50 hires to break even if there's no other costs (there's Visa and some sort of IT).

[human909]

I'm sorry but you can have it both ways!

Of course not. It was a crossroads decision. Obike cannot cash in on the data and successfully keep the bicycle scheme going at the same time.

Why not?

[Calvin27]

Why not?

Well given they couldn't even make their core business model work, I thought that would have been obvious.

[human909]

Well given they couldn't even make their core business model work, I thought that would have been obvious.

I'm sorry but your convoluted logic escapes me.

"Cashing in on data" and running a bike share scheme are not mutually exclusive. Your claim "Obike cannot cash in on the data and successfully keep the bicycle scheme going at the same time" implies they are.

The business model didn't work because their assets were trashed by vandals as well as local authorities threatening severe fines for the results of those actions. I would bet most businesses would fail if subject to such a steep uphill battle.

(Now we could conjecture that a better business model would have anticipated this and allowed for it. But the fact remains that without the vandalism and misuse then they would have been forced out.)

[Calvin27]

"Cashing in on data" and running a bike share scheme are not mutually exclusive. Your claim "Obike cannot cash in on the data and successfully keep the bicycle scheme going at the same time" implies they are.

Well if you barely have the resources to produce a management plan, then that is mutually exclusive.