Main Business Activity - Innovative 'pay as you go' bicycle hire service using a technology based locking system

Project Outline - Development and launch of a pilot service to get the product on to the streets of London and prove that the concept works

Bernie has also developed an electronic lock for every bike stand, which is operated through a keyboard and LCD display. As a result of this technology customers are able to hire and return bikes via their mobile phones. A registered user would pick a bike and call the OYBike call center to give them the code that the lock is displaying. The call centre then issues a unique pin code with which the customer can release the bike. After using the bike the customer simply locks it into an empty OYBike station and sends back the unique pin that appears on the lock display, this then ends the session. The service is operated as a ‘pay as you go’ scheme making it easy to pay for. The customer simply pays an initial £10 rental time when they first register and then they top up when their balance is getting low, the charge for each journey is then deducted from the balance. 

When Bernie set up the first OYBike station, there was considerable skepticism. “Nobody thought it would work,” says Bernie, “A flower seller who saw us told us it wouldn’t last a week. Well four years later, the same lock is still working!” Bernie wanted to prove the concept worked to the Transport for London (TfL), the mayors transport authority, which has a significant budget for alternative transport. It was with the help of the Knowledgebase Collaboration project that Bernie was able to launch a pilot with Hammersmith and Fulham Borough Council. “The funding from the Collaboration project was vital because the Council weren’t going to pay for anything themselves”, says Bernie. The project also gave Bernie the opportunity to work with Imperial College academics, who carried out an evaluation study of the pilot. 

Unfortunately for Bernie the study concluded that this type of scheme would be unlikely to change peoples mode of transport. It also said that the main users would be tourists and weekend bikers and up take would be slow. This was enough to defer TfL from making a commitment to any support. According to Bernie a scheme only takes off once it’s reached critical mass. The City of Paris launched ‘Velib” a ‘grab and go’ bike scheme in June 2007 with 20,000 bikes. Bernie says that particular scheme is now generating over 1m rides a month and the number of bikes in use has jumped by 25%. “The TfL didn’t look at what would happen if we had a critical mass of users”. 

Despite his disappointment Bernie says the study was valuable in another way. “We identified what was wrong with the system and what it would take to improve it”. Bernie is sure that London’s Mayor will decide the City must have a system as large as Paris’ in time for the 2010 Olympics and says OYBike will be tendering for the contract. It is not only Bernie who believes in OYBike’s prospects for the future; the company has attracted a buyer. “We’ve been snapped up”, says Bernie as Veolia Transport, a major transport infrastructure provider, has acquired the business. Bernie remains at the helm of his company and believes that the deeper pockets of Veolia will give them a platform to develop the business from.

In the mean time Bernie has just tendered for a scheme the city of Vancouver is planning for the 2010 Winter Games. He has also begun selling the system to other customers and has recently received an order from the University of East London, the London Borough of Tower Hamlets and two business parks. “There’s a rapidly developing demand “ says Bernie “from organisations, such as local authorities, who want to supply a pool bike scheme for their staff”.