The encyclopedia · Strategy & Leadership · Financial decision · 2014–2025
ofo burned ¥15B in three years and still owes ¥1.5B in user deposits
Valued at $3B in 2017, ofo's deposit-funded blitz collapsed in 2018; years later some 16 million users were still queued for ¥99 and ¥199 refunds.
ofo · 东峡大通 · 2018-12
What happened
ofo was founded at Peking University in 2014 by Dai Wei and grew into China's largest dockless bike-share service. At its 2017 peak it had raised over ¥15 billion across a dozen funding rounds in three years, hit a $3 billion valuation, passed 10 million orders a day and was buying 3–4 million bikes a month.
The expansion ran partly on user deposits of ¥99 and ¥199. When subsidy wars with rivals drained cash, the deposits had been spent; misappropriation surfaced and refunds froze. Dai Wei rejected a Didi buyout reportedly valued around $2 billion that required his exit, and investor vetoes blocked other deals.
By early 2019 refunds had slowed to a few thousand users a day, and the queue stood at roughly 16 million — at the late-2020 pace, a 736-year wait. Court enforcement against the operating company passed ¥1.3 billion in 2021, and Dai Wei drew consumption-restriction orders. In 2025 the app and servers shut down with the deposits still unpaid.
Why it happened
- Deposits became operating capital: ¥99 and ¥199 from tens of millions of riders funded the subsidy war, so refunds vanished when the cash did.
- The founder vetoed the exits: Dai Wei rejected Didi's offer and investor vetoes blocked the rest, leaving no buyer for a burning company.
- Scale outran unit economics: buying 3–4 million bikes a month assumed winner-takes-all, and the market never crowned one.
The lesson
ofo treated deposits as capital: ¥1.5B of user money funded a subsidy war, and when it burned, 16 million riders were left in a queue measured in centuries.
Aftermath
Dai Wei later opened About Time Coffee in New York, whose locations also closed. ofo remains China's defining deposit-crisis case of the sharing economy.
Sources
- 36氪 — 共享单车第十年，你的ofo押金退了吗？（2014年戴威创立；三年十余轮融资超150亿元；估值峰值30亿美元；日订单超1000万；高峰期每月采购300–400万辆自行车；押金99/199元；约1600万用户排队退押金；按2020年末速度需736年；运营公司东峡大通被执行超16亿元、司法纠纷458起；戴威多次被限消；2022年创办About Time Coffee后门店均关闭）
- 搜狐 — 3年烧光150亿!至今还欠着中国人15亿押金（2015–2017年烧掉超150亿元；约15亿元押金未退；1600万用户排队；戴威拒绝滴滴收购；2019年涉458起诉讼；2021年法院执行金额达13亿元；2022年天猫起诉5亿元借款；2025年APP与服务器关停）
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