O-Bike appoints Switzerland chief and announces more order on the roads
The Singapore-based bike-sharing giant has appointed Daniel Junge as its first managing director for Switzerland. He aims to get the problem of haphazardly parked bikes under control.
This writes the Handelszeitung in its new issue. The German manager, 38 years old, was until recently a member of the Board of Directors of the Zurich fitness club Renzo Balboa. Junge is leaving the company and will remain an investor. Junge is now exploring a headquarters for O-Bike in Switzerland: "In Zurich city center, near Hardbrücke and in Binz" - these are the locations Junge is specifically considering. The new Managing Director is currently putting together "a team of five people by the end of the year". O-Bike's Swiss office will cover management, marketing, communication and day-to-day business, from the app to bicycle transportation.
The new O-Bike manager wants to take particular care of bicycles that have been left in disorder. "We are working with an external service provider who collects the bikes for us and redistributes them to avoid such accumulations. In some cities, we have already set up WhatsApp group chats for this purpose," says Junge. This allows users to report bikes that have been abandoned to O-Bike.
O-Bike currently rents out around 500 bikes in Zurich and a further 100 in Winterthur. Over the next few months, the larger conurbations in German-speaking Switzerland are to be largely covered. "We want to talk to Zurich, Bern, Basel and Lucerne," says Junge. He considers around 2000 O-bikes in German-speaking Switzerland to be realistic.
