Bounce, a Bengaluru-based two wheeler rental startup which secured $72 million from investors last month, now plans to expand outside India’s top cities, a senior executive of Bounce said.
“We won’t restrict ourselves to metros. I think this is a great opportunity for tier-II, III, IV cities,” said Vivekananda Hallekere, co-founder and chief executive officer of Bounce.
The Bengaluru-based company, which clocks about a million rides a month, is aiming for a million rides a day in the next 12-16 months.
“We will go after smaller cities and are very bullish across India,” said Vivekananda.
Bounce was founded by Vivekananda Hallekere, Anil Giriraju, and Varun Aghi in 2016, while its parent company Wicked Rides was founded in 2014. Bounce was launched to provide a smart mobility solution by giving its users the option of one-way rental, which lets the users rent the bike from anywhere, travel to their destination, and drop off the bikes at any location.
The bike-sharing startup is operational in Bengaluru, Mysore, Jaipur, Udaipur, Belagavi, Manipal, Jaisalmer, Gokarna, Hyderabad, and few other cities.
“We’ll never shy away from going to an interesting market. For us, the next city need not necessarily be in India. We have to think through on why a particular city may need our solution,” Vivekanananda added.
“Finding parking is a challenge that will always exist. We will start showing which nearby spaces that guarantee parking, exclusive Bounce areas in malls, and are working with the government to create exclusive parking space for Bounce,” Vivekananda further said.
“Ola brings demand to the table for Vogo. We don’t think demand is a challenge. Demand is unlimited in the business we are in. We aren’t worried,” Vivekananda said.
Bounce is also working on manufacturing its own electric scooters. “(We have) done pilots on electric scooters, and have been working on (battery) swapping infrastructure and manufacturing electric scooter in partnership with the design and plan by us,” he added.
Conclusively, other players in the similar category includes Vogo, ONN Bikes, Tazzo Bikes, Wheelstreet, Mobycy, among others.