It wants to setup an instantly-available network of bicycles in cities around the world – but this depends on enough people wanting to rent out their spare bikes for cash.
Copenhagen-based startup Airdonkey, which is soon to launch a Kickstarter appeal for about €100,000 of funds, hopes to be as much of what co-founder Erdem Ovacik calls “a movement” for more liveable, bike-filled cities as a commercial company.
The basic premise involves enabling people with spare or little-used bikes to be albe to rent them out by the day or week to those in need, whether for tourism, commuting or anything else.
Centred around the AirDonkey “kit”, expected to cost about €80, it will entail a special rear-wheel lock which can be released via a mobile phone app, coupled with stickers marking the bike and a listing on the website, which keeps a track of available bikes’ locations via the lock, which can go 500 days between battery charges. Users find a nearby bike, pay for it and unlock the bike using the app.
The firm behind AirDonkey, Donkey Republic, say they have successfully tested the contraption around Copenhagen.
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