Bike rentals bounce back as offices resume

Back on track

Bengaluru is getting on the road with companies and businesses resuming normal operations. In what seems to be a glimmer of light for bike rental businesses, office-goers in the city have started renting two-wheelers to commute to work.

Though the demand is much lower when compared to the pre-Covid period, companies are positive on seeing an increase in new users.

Yulu, which is present in five cities, is seeing a sustained recovery in Bengaluru, according to Amit Gupta, Co-Founder & CEO.

Stating that the action in other cities is not at the same level as Bengaluru, he said, “We have already achieved 65% of the average number of daily trips that we were doing in Bengaluru in February, despite only 20-25% of people on road as compared to the pre-pandemic period.”

Gupta also mentioned that the number of users month-on-month, which was 10-15%, has doubled. “We have a new batch of 6,000 vehicles that we will deploy in the city over this month.”

Bounce, which has commenced operations in limited areas of Bengaluru and Hyderabad, has witnessed close to 30% week-on-week growth. The company did 1,30,000 daily rides last year across the country. It is doing 7000-plus daily rides currently in the two cities.

Vivekananda Hallekere, Co-Founder & CEO, Bounce, said they are seeing 30% of daily rides from new users. “Based on our research, a majority of the companies are planning to resume their offices from mid-June and we expect to see a surge in rides and traffic around that time.”

Royal Brothers, which is present in eight states, was in the daily and weekly rental business prior to Covid-19 and has recently launched the subscription model. The company currently has 43% of its total inventory out on subscription.

Abhishek Chandrashekar, CEO & Co-founder at Royal Brothers, said the subscription model started working out from Bengaluru for the company. “The growth is five times more in Bengaluru as compared to other cities that we operate in. We have also got vehicles from other cities to deploy in Bengaluru,” he said.