Zhulegeqiu charges users about one renminbi, or about 15 cents, per hour for rental. A deposit of about $10 is required unless the user has a high rating on Sesame Credit, the social credit scoring system developed by China’s Ant Financial, an affiliate of e-commerce giant Alibaba Group.
“In the long run, it may be more cost-effective to buy rather than rent a ball,” Mr. Xu said. “But we think Chinese users are willing to pay a little more for convenience.”
Earlier this month, Zhulegeqiu received around $1.4 million in venture investment from Modern Capital, a Shanghai-based venture capital firm.
Behind China’s sharing boom is a surplus of money and — some critics say — a shortage of good ideas. Venture capital firms in China invested $31 billion in 2016, up nearly one-fifth from the previous year, according to a recent KPMG report. Much of that has gone to sharing companies, as some big-money winners and a thriving start-up scene draw investors from home and abroad.
“We’re seeing a lot of money bouncing around,” said Zhou Wei, chief executive of XNode, a start-up accelerator and co-working space in Shanghai, “and foolish investments being made.”
A woman placing an order on a touch screen at a pick-up station of the car-hailing app Didi in Shanghai. The Chinese government projects the sharing economy will account for 10 percent of the country’s economic output by 2020. CreditImaginechina/Associated Press
