Chinese bicycle-sharing firm HelloRide allowed to expand S’pore fleet tenfold

SINGAPORE – A year after setting up shop in the Republic, Chinese bicycle-sharing giant HelloRide has secured approval to expand its current fleet of 1,000 shared bicycles here tenfold.

In response to queries, the Land Transport Authority (LTA) said on Saturday that HelloRide has been awarded a full licence to operate a fleet of up to 10,000 shared bicycles in Singapore until June 30, 2025.

It will make HelloRide the second-largest bicycle-sharing operator in the Republic behind current market leader Anywheel, which has an approved fleet size of up to 30,000 bicycles.

The third remaining operator, SG Bike, currently has an approved fleet size of 1,500 shared bicycles, down from 5,000 a year ago.

Anywheel and SG Bike both hold full licences.

In all, the number of shared bicycles allowed to be deployed on Singapore’s streets is now 41,500.

This is a far cry from the more than 200,000 shared bicycles that were allowed on the island at the height of the bike-sharing wave in early 2018.

At the time, there were as many as seven different bicycle-sharing operators here.

But mounting financial difficulties and the introduction of LTA’s licensing regime in 2018 led to the exit of several major players, such as ofo and oBike, which left a mess of uncollected bikes and unpaid user refunds.

HelloRide, which is backed by Chinese conglomerate Alibaba’s fintech affiliate Ant Group, was the first Chinese company to be allowed to operate a shared bicycle service in Singapore since then.

The operator was initially given a “sandbox” licence valid for up to a year, after which the company had to apply for a full licence that would allow it to operate a fleet larger than 1,000 bikes.

LTA said it considered a range of factors in assessing HelloRide’s application for a full licence.

These included the company’s fleet utilisation rate, as well as HelloRide’s track record in managing indiscriminate parking, and fulfilling licence conditions and performance standards.

LTA noted that more than 90 per cent of shared bicycle users end their trips at designated bicycle parking areas today.

This, it said, is the result of regulatory requirements such as QR-code parking, as well as ongoing efforts by bicycle-sharing operators to promote responsible parking habits.