Gbike, which operates the personal mobility (PM) sharing platform GCOO, has expanded into Los Angeles, the largest city in the western US. After launching its service in Memphis, Tennessee last July, this is its second landing on the US mainland.
GCOO started its service in LA this December with a fleet of 1,000 scooters. It is the first Asian company to throw its hat into the LA market, competing with global firms based in California such as Bird and Lime, as well as local startups like Superpedestrian, founded by MIT alumni.
LA is the city where shared PM truly began, with Bird and Lime launching their electric scooters in 2017. As early as 2019 when PM was just being introduced in Korea, LA had already acknowledged the usefulness of PM, implementing a pilot program for a free-floating system. During the initial year-long test, the city saw around 10.3 million rides, boasting one of the largest markets in the world.
Over the past two years, GCOO, which has ranked first in sales in Asia beyond Korea, is now keen to demonstrate the strength of a domestic brand with its LA expansion. After securing market share in Memphis for four months and understanding the unique characteristics of the US market, different from that of Korea, GCOO aims to prove its competitiveness in LA by applying operational know-how accumulated from Korea.
Gbike CEO Jong-Soo Yoon said, "As a leading Korean shared PM brand, it is poignant to be able to establish roots in LA, the city where PM started and home to the world's largest Koreatown." He added, "With the global expansion of eco-friendly transportation, we aim to purify the spaces of global cities and contribute to solving the worldwide problem of carbon emissions toward a net-zero goal."
Meanwhile, Gbike provides a global service that allows GCOO to be accessed from anywhere in the world with just one app. In addition to the US and Thailand, where it has already expanded, users in newly confirmed launch countries like Vietnam and Guam will be able to ride using the same app as in Korea. Moving forward, Gbike plans to accelerate its overseas expansion, creating an ecosystem that allows the convenient use of GCOO in many more countries.
