Recently, online hike-sharing has become the new favorite in China. In major cities, bikes in, yellow, orange, blue, white and green, can be seen almost everywhere on the street. It seems that these bikes appeared suddenly, adding a new beautiful scenery to Chinese cities.

Both the market and the public welcome online bike-sharing, but is it really a promising business? Well, it depends. After all, online bike-sharing platforms can never get away with huge operating cost and uncertain government policy.

Some theorists might say that online bike-sharing platforms can earn a fortune simply through deposit. Since users will always need to rent bikes, their deposit will always be kept to online bike-sharing platforms.

However, although online bike-sharing platforms may be able to use the deposit for other purposes at the primary stage, they will have to set up a special account, so that the deposit shall be used specially for its designated (指定的) purpose. As the market gets increasingly mature, they will have to do so whether to be responsible for users or in consideration of possible government regulations.

Now that online bike-sharing platforms can’t make profit through deposit, how can they become profitable as fiercer market unfolds? Although Hu Weiwei, CEO of Mobike, stated in an article that she would take Mobike as charitable (慈善的) project if she failed, running a startup is absolutely different from managing a charity organization. After all, she has to pay back investors’ billions of investment (投资).

To make profit, online bike-sharing platforms might have to increase rent fee for each trip, just as Didi did.

From this aspect, it might be a really good business. If we consider full screen ads fee, recommendation fee for business owners, etc., its annual income might reach at least RMB 15 billion. If we consider the huge operation cost, including bike repairs, bikes’ service life and labor cost, there might not be much net profit left. After all, offline operation cost has always been an unbearable burden for such internet plus mode-based startups.

A family attempting to travel to Australia without flying have arrived in the country after a three-and-a-half-month journey. Shannon Coggins, Theo Simon and their daughter Rosa, 19, left England to begin their 10 thousand-mile trip to Sydney on 16 August. The family was hoping to make it in time for Ms. Coggins’ sister’s wedding on 28 December.

The family saved up for several years to pay for the trip, which has cost them much more than air tickets would have done. They travelled through Kazakhstan, China, Laos, Thailand and Indonesia, and finally arrived in Dili, hoping to find a boat to cross the Timor Sea to Darwin, Australia. From there they planned to take a bus to Sydney.

“The world is a huge thing, and one personal thing that I do will never make the difference that we need but I want to live by my principles,” Ms. Coggins said. “I want a clean world for my daughter when she’s growing up in the future and the grandchildren. But the world is getting hotter. There is so much going on in Australia here at the moment with floods and fires, and I think we’ve all got to take that seriously.”

“All three of us have campaigned in different ways for action on climate change, so we decided our journey to Australia would have to be as low-carbon as practical,” Mr. Simon said.

The family arrived on the other side of the world just in time. But they said there were many moments during their journey across continents and oceans when they thought they might not make it to Australia. A conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia, and the danger of travelling through Iran, forced them on a four day detour (绕行) through Russia where Mr. Simon almost get arrested.

“It hasn’t always been easy, but it was worth it”, Mr. Simon added. “We want to keep this beautiful planet, don’t we?”

Need to dash to other campuses? College members can catch the free Imperial campus shuttle bus.

The College Shuttle Bus is available for staff and students, providing free transport between the South Kensington, White City and Hammersmith campuses on weekdays, in line with teaching, learning and research duties. Pre-booking is required; you should make your booking online no later than midnight prior to when you’re travelling.

Key information

●Travel timings are approximate: Although we do our best to adhere to the timetables, London traffic is frequently subject to delays.

●Want to track where your bus is: Download the Safezone app to get live GPS tracking. (tap the three horizontal lines in the top left and select “Buses”)

●Who can travel: Staff and students who need to travel between campuses. This is not a commuter service —if you live locally, you will need to use public transport to travel to campus.

●Booking my journey: Pre-booking your journey is essential.

Note: If opening the booking app in Safari, please turn off the Privacy setting “Prevent cross-site tracking”.

●What you’ll need: Along with confirmation of your reservation, you will need to show your College ID when boarding.