Corporate mobility bikes in Latin America, good idea?
Cities throughout Latin America have been rolling out bike sharing schemes for their residents over the past few years, an alternative that is also being offered by many companies wanting to give their employees a sustainable, cost effective, and healthy corporate mobility solution.
Growing Market
Although bike sharing was becoming popular even before the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in early 2020, this trend continued even more during the health crisis as public transport became less appealing, cities deployed more bicycle paths, and bike sales increased.
In Brazil (Latin America’s largest country), bike sales in 2020 jumped 50% year-over-year, according to local Bicycle Industry Association Alianca Bike. Meanwhile, to service the new mobility needs of employees and facilitate the locomotion of people in large commercial facilities, the corporate segment prepared.
Corporate Solution
Operating in larger cities such as São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Mexico City, Buenos Aires, Bogota, Santiago, Lima and others, some of the municipal bike sharing players in Latin America include Bici Q, Bikesantiago, BKT bicipública, CityBike, Ecobici, Encicla, Grow Mobility, Movete, Movo, Muvo, Tembici (pictured above), and Uber.
Although corporations could give employees benefits by way of these public services, there are more specific corporate mobility solutions which are being offered directly from vehicle leasing and fleet management companies. Below are two examples, one from a large multinational and another from a local player. Contact your supplier to find out what they are offering.
Multinational vehicle leasing and mobility company ALD Automotive offers an electric bike sharing scheme that can be unlocked through a mobile app when a desired bike is chosen via a totem (recharging station) that is installed in a place of easy access to electricity and an internet signal. Mobile chargers are available if needed.
Employees need to download the E-bike Sharing ALD app which is available in the App Store or Google Play Store. The service integrates with other shared mobility offerings such as car sharing.
ALD Automotive e-bike (source: ALD Automotive)
Meanwhile, also offering multimodal solutions is Brazilian vehicle leasing and mobility company Movida which provides electric bicycles in partnership with E-Moving, a strategy of which the company calls I-Move.
E-bikes are ideal for large industrial parks, condominium complexes, and hotel chains, not to mention for professionals such as delivery personnel and sales promotors or any worker which needs to make periodic trips. According to Movida, bikes can be customized with your company’s identity so it can also benefit from mobile advertising.
Movida e-bikes (source: Movida)
Advantages & Challenges
Besides lowering expenses such as fuel, parking lots, and taxi, some of the corporate advantages of E-biking include having a healthier team and providing an ecological solution, the latter being a corporate social responsibility continuously more popular in today’s world.
Some of the challenges, however, include building the appropriate infrastructure to station your bicycles and restrictions you may face during bad weather conditions.
In the end, having an alternative such as E-bicycle sharing could prove beneficial for many companies if deployed in the correct manner and if other mobility options are also available.
