Is bike-sharing out of control? The prisoner's dilemma under the hot topic of the whole nation

"Little guy, do you think I won't recognize you if you put on a vest?" When the lines in the skit appeared in reality, the shared bicycles wearing "vests" have made people lose their direction. Last week, a shared bicycle covered with "golden armor" and equipped with a power bank once again became a national topic, and the price of 1.5 yuan for half an hour of riding also refreshed the highest unit price of shared bicycles. Complaints came like a tide. The worry of "not having enough colors" seems a bit ridiculous at the moment, but the continuous emergence of new bicycles has repeatedly challenged the production scale boundary of economics. The shared bicycle race in July has reached the sprint stage. Where will this chariot, which is hailed as the representative of the "new economy", go? Perhaps this is the answer that everyone is eager to know.

Expansion! Expansion! Shared bikes demonstrate speed and passion

In the past week, players in the shared bicycle industry have demonstrated what "speed and passion" means with their strength.

If you passed by the streets of Beijing and Hangzhou last Thursday morning, you might have been dazzled by a shared bicycle painted in "tycoon gold". Although netizens complained that the color was "ugly", this shared bicycle named "Cool Ride Bike" quickly became a national topic. In some southern cities, "zebra bikes" with black and white lines on the body are also quietly waiting for the opportunity to explode. Excited people began to rethink a question: Is the worry of "not enough colors" redundant? Since the market can accommodate the "heavy metal rock" of the tycoon gold chariot, then the literary and fresh candy-colored bicycles, or the wild leopard and tiger patterns, may also be able to wait for the day to come out. More importantly, by painting the green version of the bicycle with no personality with gold powder and installing a power bank, the unit price of riding can naturally change from 30 cents per half hour to 1.5 yuan. This speed of making money can make investors excited and unable to sleep.

But for high-end players of shared bicycles, color is like skin, once it is determined, it cannot be changed, but there are many ways to improve the appearance. A good story can also bring the company into a new stage of quality riding. Not long ago, ofo announced that it would change its official name to "ofo Yellow Car", which on the one hand narrowed the distance between the brand and users and turned the nickname into a big name, and on the other hand re-emphasized the brand effect. On June 9, ofo Yellow Car released a new "Princess Car", with the first batch of 10,000 vehicles to be put into use in Beijing and Shanghai. This new car, tailored for women, has a retro-style refined design in terms of product and experience, and fully considers the needs of female users in terms of practicality.

In addition to adding product lines, ofo has also taken steps to expand overseas. On June 10, the World Expo was held in Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan. As the only official shared bicycle partner of the China Pavilion at this World Expo, 1,000 ofo bikes will be fully deployed on the streets of Astana. This is also the fourth overseas country that ofo has entered since announcing its overseas expansion plan last year, following Silicon Valley in the United States, Cambridge in the United Kingdom, and Singapore.

Mobike's expansion has not stopped at all, and the list of newly entered Chinese cities is constantly updated. "It has exceeded 90 cities, and several new cities have been opened in the past few days alone. Just now it was Panjin, but there will be new cities this weekend."

More? Or less? It’s becoming increasingly difficult to give a standard answer

How many bicycles does a city really need? With the emergence of shared bicycles, the standard answer to this math problem has become increasingly difficult to give.

On May 23, Cai Tuanjie, deputy director of the Ministry of Transport's Transportation Services Department, pointed out that according to incomplete statistics, there are currently more than 30 Internet bicycle rental companies in my country, with a total of more than 10 million vehicles, more than 100 million registered users, and more than 1 billion services. At present, some areas in some cities have seen an oversupply of shared bicycles.

In March this year, photos of 4,500 shared bicycles in Shanghai being seized by the government in parking lots for being parked indiscriminately and occupying public resources went viral. The colorful bicycles were densely packed together, and there was no longer the carefree and comfortable streets and alleys in the warm spring of March. The problems of shared bicycles are becoming increasingly prominent, including excessive deployment of vehicles, saturation of local public spaces, disorderly parking of bicycles, high failure rates, inability to accurately locate, irregular deposit management, and accidents involving minors while riding.

According to Tencent Venture Capital’s research, the population of the four first-tier cities of Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen totals 71.32 million, and the current number of shared bikes put into use is 1.08 million. If ofo and Mobike continue to put them into use, the number can reach 1.81 million, but it is far from consuming the 30 million bike production capacity. Even if it sinks to second-, third- and fourth-tier cities, a total of about 17.45 million bikes will be needed, which is still a long way from the total order of 30 million bikes of ofo and Mobike this year.

Are there too many shared bikes? Judging from the numbers, yes. But on Monday mornings when people are rushing to go to work, everyone will encounter the embarrassment of not being able to find a good bike after ten minutes of going out. Therefore, Cai Tuanjie pointed out that the Ministry of Transportation will not require a total control of shared bikes, but will encourage cities to formulate their own management methods based on actual conditions and in accordance with local management methods.

Where is cycling heading? Strict regulation will speed up the market reshuffle

How to manage shared bicycles is a test of a city's wisdom. With the intensive release of policies, shared bicycles will also usher in a stage of strict management, and the reshuffle of the market will also accelerate.

At the just concluded Science and Technology Expo, the Beijing Municipal Commission of Economics and Information Technology announced that it had communicated with Daxing District to follow up on the pilot project, and the number of electronic fences in the city will increase to about 700 this year. In the future, relevant departments will also promote Mobike, Bluegogo, Cool Ride and other companies to access the government supervision and service platform for shared bicycles as soon as possible on the basis of the inclusion of ofo. On June 7, the government supervision and service platform for shared bicycles went online in Tongzhou District. Beijing will take the lead in using Beidou navigation technology to achieve refined management of shared bicycles. On May 22, the Ministry of Transport’s website released the "Guiding Opinions on Encouraging and Regulating the Development of Internet Rental Bicycles (Draft for Comments)", which proposes to stipulate that shared bicycles promote real-name use, strengthen credit management, record violations in credit records, and standardize requirements for users in riding and parking. On May 15, three group standards for shared bicycles jointly initiated and drafted by the Shanghai Bicycle Industry Association and the Tianjin Bicycle and Electric Vehicle Industry Association entered the reporting and approval stage.

For the rapidly developing shared bicycles, strict and detailed regulatory policies will also promote the reshuffle of the industry. For some shared bicycle companies, the model of relying on deposits to manage finances and maintain livelihoods is no longer feasible. The core value of shared bicycles in the future may not lie in the number of bicycles deployed, but in data entry and payment entry, which is also favored by capital.

In March this year, when talking about the decisive battle of shared bicycles, ofo said that the decisive battle would begin around July. The time is getting closer, but the battle of shared bicycles does not seem to be over yet. According to the forecast of iResearch Consulting, after the regulation, the shared bicycle market will be further reshuffled and integrated, and then China's shared bicycles will usher in new development opportunities. By the end of 2017, the scale of the national shared bicycle market will reach 50 million users, an estimated increase of about 260%.

As a winner of Toutiao's Qingyun Plan and Baijiahao's Bai+ Plan, the 2019 Baidu Digital Author of the Year, the Baijiahao's Most Popular Author in the Technology Field, the 2019 Sogou Technology and Culture Author, and the 2021 Baijiahao Quarterly Influential Creator, he has won many awards, including the 2013 Sohu Best Industry Media Person, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Beijing Third Place, the 2015 Guangmang Experience Award, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Finals Third Place, and the 2018 Baidu Dynamic Annual Powerful Celebrity.