Qingju, a China-based bicycle rental service spun off by ride hailing platform Didi Chuxing, has raised $150m from investors including telecommunications and internet group SoftBank, The Information reported yesterday.
SoftBank was joined by Legend Capital, the venture capital firm formed by conglomerate Legend Holdings, according to people with direct knowledge of the deal. Didi itself is investing a further $850m alongside the external funding.
Formed in 2018 and incubated within Didi, Qingju operates an app-based bicycle sharing platform that forms part of Didi’s two-wheeled business unit alongside electric scooter rental service Jietu. This represents its first external funding, the sources told The Information.
Didi also acquired the assets of bankrupt China-based bicycle rental platform Bluegogo at the end of 2017, and had tried and failed to purchase another one, Ofo, the following year.
Cheng Wei, chief executive of Didi, told Reuters last week that the company plans to expand across its services, including bicycle sharing, as it seeks to grow its customer base to 800 million monthly active users by 2022.
Photo by Nissangeniss, c/o Wikimedia Commons.
