中國共享經濟先鋒Ofo陷入財務危機

Brilliantly simple, emission-free solution to the problem of urban congestion? Or the maddening height of venture-backed technology hubris?

對城市擁堵給出的一個簡單、零排放的精妙解決方案?還是一種得到風投支持的、已經達到瘋癲地步的技術狂妄?

Dockless rented bicycles swept into Chinese cities two years ago. Their arrival inspired a wave of similar mobility experiments around the world, even as city dwellers in China bemoaned the sight of candy-colored bikes heaped in unholy piles on their sidewalks.

兩年前，無樁出租自行車席卷了中國的城市。它們的到來在全世界啟發(fā)了一輪類似的出行實驗浪潮，盡管糖果色的自行車在人行道上堆起的齷齪景象令中國的城市居民怨聲載道。

Now, one of China’s leading bike start-ups, Ofo, is facing serious financial problems. Its founder is on a government blacklist for unpaid bills. Millions of riders who placed deposits are demanding their money back. And the business model used by many of China’s tech firms — spend furiously to acquire new users, worry about profits later — is showing its limits.

如今，中國領先的自行車初創(chuàng)企業(yè)之一Ofo正面臨嚴重的財務問題。其創(chuàng)始人因拖欠賬單已被列入政府的黑名單。數百萬支付了押金的騎行用戶正在要求退還押金。許多中國科技企業(yè)慣用的商業(yè)模式——先燒錢買用戶，后期再談盈利——正顯示出其局限性。

The run of Ofo customers seeking refunds appears to have started last week. Doubts about the company’s financial health had swirled for months. People said on social media they were unable to get refunds on deposits of $15 to $30, which they put down to rent Ofo’s bumblebee-yellow bikes. (The company’s Chinese nickname translates as “Little Yellow Bike.”)

Ofo用戶要求退回押金的狂潮大約始于上周。對該公司財務健康狀況的疑問已盤桓數月。有人在社交媒體上說，他們無法獲得為租借Ofo的明黃色自行車支付的15到30美元的押金退款。(該公司中文昵稱為“小黃車”。)

But according to state media, one user posted on the social platform Weibo last week that he had quickly gotten a refund after writing an email to Ofo — in English.

但據國有媒體報道，上周，一位用戶在微博上發(fā)帖稱，他在用英文給Ofo寫了一封郵件之后，很快收到了退還的押金。

The post touched off outrage about the apparent differences in the way the company was treating Chinese people and foreigners. It also set off a rush among other Ofo users seeking refunds.

該貼掀起了民眾對于該公司對待中國和外國人明顯差異的憤怒，并引發(fā)了其他Ofo用戶索要退款的熱潮。

“Ofo’s user base is large, so there is a possibility that the number of applications for deposit refunds will soar,” the company said late Monday in a statement posted on Weibo. “Please be patient. We promise that deposits will be refunded according to the proper procedures. To all users, please don’t worry!”

“Ofo用戶基數大，存在退押金申請激增的可能，”該公司在周一晚發(fā)布的微博聲明中說。“請廣大用戶耐心等待，我們承諾依序妥善處理好退押金事宜，請廣大用戶放心!”

The statement appears only to have made people worry more.

該聲明似乎反而讓公眾更加擔心。

Many customers used the Ofo app to apply for refunds and joined a queue that had climbed to nearly 12 million people by Thursday.In an email to employees on Wednesday, Ofo’s founder, Dai Wei, acknowledged that the company had been under financial strain all year.

許多用戶通過Ofo應用申請了退押金，并加入了周四已攀升到將近1200萬人的排隊陣列。周三，在給員工的一封郵件中，Ofo創(chuàng)始人戴威承認，公司今年一整年都背負著財務壓力。

“I thought countless times about cutting operating capital to pay back some of users’ deposits and debts to suppliers, and even about dissolving the company and filing for bankruptcy,” Mr. Dai wrote. An Ofo spokesman did not respond to requests for comment.

“我無數次想過把運營資金全砍掉，用來退還部分用戶押金和供應商欠款，甚至是解散公司、申請破產，”戴威寫道。Ofo發(fā)言人未回應置評請求。

Hundreds of people have also shown up at Ofo’s Beijing headquarters this week.

本周，上千人已出現在Ofo的北京總部大廈。

On Thursday, the company’s fifth-floor office was filled with police officers and shouting customers. Two women were crying.

周四，該公司的五層辦公樓里到處是警察和呼喊的用戶。有兩名女性在哭泣。

Zhang Wei, a migrant worker, had come to the office on Monday seeking a refund and had left without it, missing a day of work in the process. Mr. Zhang, 27, showed up again Thursday morning and wound up angrily kicking an Ofo employee.

民工張偉周一曾來過辦公樓要求退還押金未果，還在這過程中耽擱了一天的工作。周四早晨，27歲的張再次前來，結果憤怒中踢打了Ofo的員工。

After being taken to the local police station and released, he returned to the Ofo office. He finally managed to convince an employee to transfer him the amount he had put down, around $30.

他在被帶到當地警察局后獲釋，隨即又回到了Ofo辦公樓。最后他終于說服了一名員工把他支付的30美元左右金額轉賬給他。

By then, he had spent a total of around $15 to travel to and from Ofo’s offices by subway and taxi. But he said it was worth it.

到那時，他已經總共花了大約15美元乘地鐵和出租車來回往返Ofo辦公樓。但他說這也值了。

“It was never about the money,” he said. “I just needed to vent.”

“這不是錢的問題，”他說。“我就是為了出這一口氣。”

Liu Jingyi, a student from the northern city of Xi’an, had forgotten about her Ofo deposit until she saw people talking about it on Weibo last month.

來自北方城市西安的學生劉靜怡之前忘記了她的Ofo押金，直到上個月她看到人們在微博上談論這件事情才想起。

Ms. Liu, 23, said she was not optimistic that she would get her money back. 23歲的劉說，對于拿回錢，她不大樂觀。

“Look at how many shared bikes there are now,” she said. “I always felt that these cash-burning business models would have to end sooner or later.”

“你看現在共享單車這么多，”她說。“我是一直都覺得他們這種燒錢的模式遲早要完。”

When the history of the current go-go era in China’s tech industry is written, Ofo’s rise and fall may serve as a useful parable. In bike rentals, ride hailing, food delivery and more, a good business idea attracts a swarm of copycats. Cutthroat competition ensues. Many companies and investors get burned.

在中國科技行業(yè)當前這個蓬勃發(fā)展的時代被寫入歷史之時，Ofo的興衰或許可以成為一則有益的寓言。在自行車租賃、叫車、送餐等行業(yè)，一個好的商業(yè)創(chuàng)意會吸引大批模仿者。繼而發(fā)生惡性競爭。許多公司和投資者因此蒙受損失。

Mr. Dai founded Ofo in 2014 while studying at Peking University. Cities like New York, London and Paris had long had programs for renting bicycles for short time periods. But those programs required riders to return the bikes to docks fixed to the ground.

戴威于2014年在北京大學學習期間創(chuàng)立了Ofo。像紐約、倫敦和巴黎這樣的城市長期以來都有短期租賃自行車的服務。但它們要求騎車者將自行車送回固定的停車點。

Ofo and another Beijing start-up, Mobike, realized that by equipping bikes with GPS and digital locks, commuters could use their phones to rent bikes, freeing them from fixed docks. That would keep bikes circulating, and available wherever people needed them.

Ofo和另一家北京初創(chuàng)企業(yè)摩拜意識到，通過給自行車配備GPS和數字鎖，通勤者可以用手機租賃自行車，將自行車從固定的停車點解放出來。這可以保持自行車的流通，并且在人們需要自行車的任何地方都可以使用。

Almost overnight, the streets of China’s cities started to resemble a kind of bicycle free-for-all. Imitators sprouted by the dozen, and other start-ups angled to find the next big thing in sharing: umbrellas, basketballs, cellphone power banks, even concrete mixers.

幾乎一夜之間，中國城市的街道充滿了免費提供給所有人的自行車。十幾個模仿者紛紛涌現，其他的初創(chuàng)公司也在尋找下一件可供分享的熱點：雨傘、籃球、手機充電寶，甚至是混凝土攪拌機。

Investment poured in. China’s tech giants, including Alibaba and Didi Chuxing, put money into Ofo. Eventually, the start-up raised $2.2 billion, according to Crunchbase. State media hailed bike-sharing as one of China’s “new four great inventions,” putting it and high-speed rail, e-commerce and smartphone payments on the same plane as paper, movable type, the compass and gunpowder.

投資不斷涌入。阿里巴巴和滴滴出行等中國科技巨頭向Ofo投入了資金。根據Crunchbase的數據，這家初創(chuàng)公司最終籌集到了22億美元。國家媒體稱贊共享單車與高鐵、電子商務和智能手機支付一起成為中國的“新四大發(fā)明”，與紙張、活字印刷、指南針和火藥相提并論。

But it did not take long for the fever to become madness. Vandals set two-wheelers ablaze and heaved them into rivers and canals. Whispers abounded about rental companies hiring people to destroy rivals’ bikes or dump them in out-of-the-way places.Beijing and other cities decided they had had enough, and blocked start-ups from adding more bikes to their streets.

但沒過多久，熱烈就變成了瘋狂。蓄意破壞的人點燃自行車，把它們扔進河流和水渠。關于租車公司雇人毀壞競爭對手的自行車或把它們扔到偏僻地方的傳言不絕于耳。北京和其他城市覺得受夠了，于是阻止那些初創(chuàng)企業(yè)在街道上增加自行車。

Financial pressure started building as well. As long as new riders kept signing up, cash kept flowing in the form of deposits. But it has been expensive for the companies to replace damaged stock, and to hire workers to haul bikes all day from low- to high-demand locations.

財務壓力也開始增大。只要新用戶不斷注冊，現金就會以充值的形式持續(xù)流動。但對于這些公司來說，更換受損的庫存，雇傭工人整天從低需求地區(qū)運自行車到高需求地區(qū)，成本是很高昂的。

In April, Mobike was acquired by Meituan-Dianping, a food-delivery giant whose financial resources could help it continue to subsidize cheap bike trips. But Ofo has had trouble lately raising money from investors, Mr. Dai said in his letter this week. The company withdrew from several overseas markets, including the United States, this year just months after entering them.

今年4月，美團點評收購了摩拜。美團點評是一家食品快遞巨頭，其財務資源可以幫助摩拜繼續(xù)補貼廉價的自行車騎行。但戴威在本周的信中說，Ofo最近在從投資者那里籌集資金方面遇到了麻煩。該公司今年在進入包括美國在內的幾個海外市場幾個月后就撤出了。

Mr. Dai, who said just last year that Ofo had ballooned to more than $2 billion in value, was recently added to an official blacklist of credit defaulters. According to a government database, he and Ofo’s parent company owe a total of $7.8 million related to various contract disputes. Being on the list means Mr. Dai can be blocked from booking fancy hotels or flying first class.

戴威去年還說，Ofo的價值已經激增到20多億美元，然而他最近被列入了官方的信用違約黑名單。根據政府的數據，他和Ofo的母公司因各種合同糾紛總共欠下780萬美元。被列入該名單意味著戴威可能被禁止預訂豪華酒店或乘坐頭等艙。

Ofo’s bikes still have their fans in China. Bi Wenwen, a 38-year-old entrepreneur in Shanghai, applied for a deposit refund in November. She does not expect to receive it, but she said she would still use Ofo in the meantime.

Ofo的自行車在中國仍有粉絲。38歲的上海創(chuàng)業(yè)者畢雯雯于11月申請退還押金。她預計不會收回這筆錢，但她表示，在此期間仍會使用Ofo。

“It provides a lot of convenience,” Ms. Bi said.

“它提供了很多便利，”畢雯雯說。

Wang Jinzhi applied for a refund from Ofo two weeks ago. But he has already lost all confidence in the sharing economy.

王近知兩周前向Ofo申請退款。但他已經對共享經濟完全失去信心。

Mr. Wang, a 28-year-old financial analyst in Beijing, lost the $500 deposit he paid a high-end car-sharing company after the company folded. He also failed to get his deposit back from Bluegogo, another bike-rental start-up.

28歲的王近知是北京的一名金融分析師，在一家高端汽車共享公司倒閉后，它損失了支付給這家公司的500美元定金。他也沒能從另一家自行車租賃初創(chuàng)公司小藍單車取回押金。

“Actually, I didn’t have much confidence right from the beginning,” Mr. Wang said, about the sharing economy. “So many similar companies fighting against one another.”

“其實本來開始的時候就沒什么信心，”王近知在談到共享經濟時說。“這么多同類型的公司互打。”

In the end, he bought his own bike.

最后，他自己買了一輛自行車。