The New York Times details the struggles of PBSC Urban Solutions, a company that (used to) operate bike share programs and build bike share bikes:
“That bike, nobody can argue with his bike,” said Josh Squire, the chief executive of CycleHop, a bike-share operator that does not use the Bixi technology.
The Montreal company also developed free-standing docking stations with solar panels for power and Wi-Fi to transfer payment and operations data. The stations, which can be lifted onto the back of a truck, could be easily removed for road repairs, construction projects or unfriendly Montreal winters.
But the city’s dream of self-financing proved elusive. While money was flowing in from foreign buyers, it was immediately going out again to keep Montreal’s bikes rolling. Users could buy passes of various durations at rates that had been set unrealistically low, while operating costs were higher than anticipated. That left the company struggling to pay its suppliers.
The video below is from an earlier Times article about the problems that have popped up in New York's bike share program: