The Chinese bike rental company Ofo has shut down its operations in India and fired most of its 30 employees in India.

The Alibaba-backed startup had launched operations in India in January 2018. Ofo, which offers station-free bikes operated via an app, claimed to have completed 1.1 million rides within four months in India.

According to Wikipedia, ofo is a Beijing-based bicycle sharing company founded in 2014. It operates over 10 million yellow bicycles in 250 cities and 20 countries. The dockless ofo system uses its smartphone app to unlock and locate nearby bicycles, charging an hourly rate for use. As of 2018, the company is valued at up to $2 billion and has over 62.7 million monthly active users.

Rajarshi Sahai, director of public policy and communications for Ofo was quoted saying “We are shutting down our country operation. It is part of a global strategy to shrink the footprint.”

Besides India, Ofo has reportedly fired over 50 per cent of their employees in Singapore and have been shutting down operations in Australia as well. The move is also an alarming call for other global and local players in this space such as Mobike, Ola Pedal, Zoomcar PEDL, Mobicy, and Yulu.