Hi there! This is an AI-translated article produced by KrASIA’s parent company, 36Kr. 36Kr is China’s leading tech and business media and delivers a gargantuan amount of exclusive news on Chinese startups.
KrASIA wants to share these articles first-hand by translating these information swiftly with AI and very minimal human effort. Please understand that the translation may affect your reading experience. Nonetheless, feel free to contact us (hello@kr-asia.com) should you have any feedback.
To Chinese readers, if you’d like to read the original article in Chinese: click here.
Established in June 2016, the office equipment leasing platform RRZuJi （人人租机，literally machine leasing for everyone） has completed tens of millions RMB (Series A) financing from Ant Financial. The funds will be used for team expansion, upstream merchant integration and the construction of physical rental service portals.
This is not Ant Financials’ first investment in IT leasing. RRZuJi is their fourth investment after TanWorth 探物, NeiSha内啥, and HaiNiaoWo 海鸟窝.
The three other companies are consumer-focused in digital 3C products (computers, communication, consumer electronics). RRZuJi is a B2B credit-free office equipment rental platform for SMEs, targeting the long-tail customers. The current revenue per use is 5000 yuan.
Hong Guozhi, the founder of RRZuJi pointed out that the penetration rate of office equipment leasing is 60% in Europe and the United States, but the domestic penetration rate is only about 5%. China has 50 million SMEs with 16,000 new ones every day. For these SMEs, renting is a more flexible form of asset ownership.
Office leasing is not a new industry. However, RRZuJi integrated the concept of sharing economy by incorporating the capabilities of the Internet and the credit lease model. This business model evolves around two important characteristics: customer traction and risk management.
- Customer traction
Office leasing is somewhat a niche market used by businesses and requires customization. There may not be enough customers at the beginning which often affects customers’ experience and perception of early customers.
Hence, RRZuJi partners with vendors in different in cities and now covers 220 cities with more than 20,000 vendors with a rich product line, serving not only the SMEs but to end-users as well.
They have a strong online and offline marketing team. The company has put its focus on SEO marketing and partners marketers in different cities. Thus far, RRZuJi has signed contracts with more than 500 business hubs and incubators.
- Risk management
Risk control is an unavoidable topic in the sharing economy. Due to the lack of corporate credit information system in China, the early stage solution is to obtain data physically. This is a long and tedious process. However, in March of this year, RRZuJi is able to access Alipay’s enterprise Sesame Credit to assess the credibility of their customers.
Leveraging on Alipay’s mini-program (sub-applications on WeChat), their orders increased by 6 times in 6 months, reaching an average of 1000 orders a day. The waiting period was reduced by 10 times. Alipay’s mini-program has now become their core platform for users.
At the same time, RRZuJi is also one of the alliances of the “Xinyi+” 信易 campaign by the National Development and Reform Commission, encouraging more SMEs to enjoy the convenience and benefits brought by good credit.
Compared with the short-term 3C leasing for end-users, office equipment leasing is mostly long-term. What is lacking in the industry is the after-rental service for enterprises. RRZuJi took two years to develop their management system where it provides a unified customer service for the merchants. In the future, their partnering agents in different cities will also play important role in the after-rental services if SMEs require door-to-door service. This is their unique value proposition.
After the addition of ant financial, RRZuJi and Alipay will have a deeper partnership in credit and traffic building. At the same time, RRZuJi will continue to acquire new customers via larger enterprise service platforms.
Hong graduated from Zhongshan University and worked in the new energy, environmental protection and as a VC in the TMT industries for 6 years. The commercial director Cui Jiehao has 10 years of experience in the leasing industry.
