The Master List of the Collaborative Economy: Rent and Trade Everything

Posted on February 24th, 2013 in: Collaborative Economy, Industry Index

A Research Focus: Collaborative Economy
My next Open Research report  (see my body of research) will be on the Rise of the Collaboration Economy.  If you’d like to be interviewed for this upcoming report, please fill out this submission form.   In my career as an analyst, I often list out all the players in a category, announce a formal research effort, then publish a series of analysis, as part of my continuing methodology.  I’ll also be presenting my findings as a speaker at LeWeb, whose theme “Digital Hippies” is directly related to this trend.  Thanks to friend Loic Lemeur for triggering this idea.

[Collaborative Economy Defined:  A digital system that manages the coordination of buyers and sellers who offer or exchange used products and remnant services]

The Three Categories of Collaborative Economy Markets
Within this market, there are multiple use cases, right now, we see the following three categories:

Market Type Description Examples
First Collaborative Market Manufactures and business owners that are now offering products for rent or barter BMW and Toyota have made motions to offer cars from their lot for rent –beyond selling them.
Second Collaborative Market Often denoted as the “Used or Second Hand” market a consumer may offer to rent or lease of used products or remnant services. Lyft allows for any consumer to act like a taxi, and pick up members of the service.  Craigslist and eBay (disclosure: client) empowers the selling of used products, worldwide
Third Collaborative Market Barter, gifting, or non-currancy exchanges of used products or remnant services. Toyswap allows parents to exchange toys with other parents, rather than purchase products that their kids will outgrow. Giftflow encourages users to ask for what they need, then to help others in the future, paying it forward

Market Rises: Media Attention, Over $2billion in Funding
There’s been remarkable media attention on this topic as vendors like AirBnB, Lyft, Uber, and TaskRabbit have gained the attention of the media.  Even battles against this category have emerged in San Francisco, as well as in Amsterdam on unofficial places of rent.  We don’t foresee this space to go down, as cursory analysis indicates that there’s been a whopping $2billion in venture funding into this category, out of a sample of 200 startups.  A spin out from the consumer social networking category,  this movement will have significant runway before true winners are decided.

Disruptions to CPG, Retail, Service Industry, and Governments
Also, there are extensive disruptions to companies who create products or services.   If this trend continues at the speed of current trajectory, it can force retail and product based companies to acquire startups in this space, or offer products in their own stores for lease or barter.  Furthermore, governments are displaced if the barter economy rises, and tax revenues are diminished as people share products –with no money exchanged.  Lastly, we’re seeing new forms of untraditional currency emerging, including peer to peer BitCoin which is not backed by any federal reserve note, nor precious metal –it’s backed by processing power.

How You Can Get Involved with this Research

  1. Submit a startup in the comments below
  2. Request to be interviewed for this upcoming Open Research report in this web form.
  3. Share this post with others.

List of 200 Companies in the Collaborative Economy
Using the spirit of this space, I contacted a TaskRabbit (thanks Rachel) to conduct significant research, over 22.5 hours to aggregate a list of startups in this space, from a variety of sources.   This database will be the primary source of a sample which I’ll use to parse out trends and data types for this upcoming report.   Update:  Many of these examples and specific language was from the Collaborative Consumption Hub, which I failed to provide full attribution (my fault) upon first publication of this piece, please see the many resources available there, including their many service offerings.  Update: March 26: They’ve built a dynamic directory on their website, which you should visit.

  • Personal Services
    • Rent a Friend Rent a friend for family events, social, business, workout, companionship
    • Hire A Boston Wingwoman Your WingWoman will put YOU in the spotlight (help you meet women in a social scene).
    • Airtime The platform for great video conversation
  • Miscellaneous Services
    • Nanny in the Clouds Changing the way young families fly by connecting them with an in-flight nanny
    • Wello Bye Bye Gym, Hello Convenience
    • GetMaid Instant booking, effortless payments, and exceptional home cleaning at your door within two hours.
  • Car sharing
    • Uber Everyone’s Private Driver
    • Zipcar Wheels when you want them
    • Sidecar Connects people with space in their car to those who need a ride
    • Lyft Your Friend with a Car
    • GoGet Get going fast. Never look back.
    • WhizzCar Wheels on Demand (Singapore)
    • Autoshare Keys to Wonderful (Toronto)
    • Stattauto CarSharing – Munich Germany
    • CarSharing CarSharing Austria (operated by Zipcar)
    • Zazcar Car Share Brazil
    • City Car Club Book, jump in, drive away…
    • Cambiocar CarSharing
    • Autolibre Car Share – very small cars, maybe electric with battery packs and stations around France to recharge. No English translation
  • Car sharing (from big automobile manufactures)
    • BMW Drive NOW Premium Car Sharing by BMW i, Mini, and Sixt
    • Volkswagen Quicar Car Share by VW (Hanover)
    • Peugeot Mu Mobiliy Services Rentals
    • Daimler Car2Go Sponteneity on Wheels
  • Peer-to-Peer Car Sharing
  • Bike sharing
  • Ride sharing
    • Zimride Grab a Seat. Save money and meet people heading your way.
    • Nuride Get rewards for greener trips
    • Liftshare Travel Together UK
    • Jayride Travel A to B with Jayride – UK/Ireland, AUS, NZ
    • GoCarShare Life’s a journey…share it
    • Carpooling Join the leading Global carpooling network!
    • Caronetas Smart Rides – Brazil
    • DuckSeat Ridesharing for Events
    • Avego Welcome to Avego, your ride sharing network
    • Amovens Find ridesharing partners
    • Tickengo Click to get a ride
  • Solar Power
  • Toy Rental
  • Textbook Rental
  • Art Rental
    • Art.sy Learn about and collect the worlds greatest art
    • Artsicle What’s Your Art Style?
    • TurningArt Art that speaks for you
  • Fashion Rental
  • Movies
  • General Online Rental
  • Peer-to-Peer Rental
    • Zilok Zilok Rent anything, On-line! Rentals from Businesses and Individuals.
    • Neighborgoods Save money and resources by sharing stuff with your friends
    • Rentoid The place to rent anything
    • Ecomodo The marketplace of good returns
    • HireThings Hire in what you need, hire out what you have
    • Rentalic Rent anything anywhere (site under construction for another month)
    • RentStuff A RentalCompare Company
    • Open Shed Why buy when you can share?
  • Neighborhood Rental/Share/Market
  • Unique Eperiences
    • Gidsy Find Unique things to do
    • Vayable Book an experience when you travel
    • Sidetour Challenge the Ordinary
  • Peer-to-Peer Travel
  • Errand/Task Networks (general and professional)
    • RedBeacon Trusted Pros for a Better Home
    • Expert Bids Submit your bids. Get proposals and reviews. Save time and money.
    • Crowdflower “The World’s Largest Workforce – large, data-heavy projects broken into small tasks, distributed to < 1.5 million on-demand global contributors”
    • Taskrabbit Outsource Errands or Tasks at the Touch of a Button
    • Zaarly Life is short. Do what you love.
    • Airrun It’s everyone’s personal assistant.
    • Mytaskangel An online marketplace where people connect to get everyday tasks done in their local communities
    • Gigwalk Gigwalk connects businesses with the best people to get work done anywhere
    • Airtasker Find people to help you around the home and office.
  • Social Food Networks
    • Gobble Personalized Dinners Delivered
    • Grubwithus Never eat alone on Grubwithus
    • Eatwithme Food. Photos. Writing.
    • Wok+Wine Wok+Wine is the world’s most effective serendipity machine
  • Storage Networks
  • Parking Spots
  • Shared Studios/Workshops/Workspaces
    • 3rd Space Studios 3rd Space Studios benefit from large spaces and studio members with a range of disciplines
    • Techshop Build your dreams here
    • Newworkcity Working for yourself doesn’t have to mean working by yourself.
    • Studiomates STUDIOMATES is a collaborative workspace of designers, illustrators, bloggers, writers, and developers.
    • Bees Office Work alongside amazing people!
    • Coloft LAs startup hub
    • Desksnearme Need a space to work?
    • Deskwanted Find your ideal working community
    • Opendesks OpenDesks helps you find, share, and manage places to meet and work
    • Desksurfing Coworking spaces around the world
  • Social Lending
    • Zopa Get a loan today
    • Prosper We connect people who want to borrow money with people who want to invest money
    • Lending Club Investors earn better returns, borrowers pay lower rates
    • Enterprise Den The marketplace for success
    • Qifang P2P Lending for Chinese Student Loans
  • Social Currencies
    • Ven It’s time for a new kind of money
    • The Liquidity Network Developing a complementary currency for Ireland
    • Timebanks Building equality and caring community economies through inclusive exchange of time and talent
    • Letsystems Local exchange trading system
  • Taxi Sharing
    • Taxi2 Share. Get there.
    • Taxistop More with less…
    • Weeels More riding, less driving, no parking
  • Bartering
    • Ourgoods A barter network for the creative community
    • Itex Connect. Trade. Save.
    • Bartercard The card that works for you
    • Tourboarding How to stay and play in China for Free
  • Crowdfunding (investments, not loans)
  • Gardens
    • Urbangardenshare Urban Garden Share pairs together eager gardeners with eager gardens
    • Landshare Connecting growers to people with land to share
    • Yardshare Front yard, side yard, & backyard landscaping ideas & garden design pictures shared by homeowners and landscape contractors.
    • Servicevines Cherry pick the best landscapers from your back yard
  • Skill Sharing
  • Big Marketplaces
  • Free/Gift Exchanges
    • Freecycle Changing the world one gift at a time
    • Giftflow Give what you can. Ask for what you need. Pay it forward.
    • Ziilch Where good stuff goes free
    • Exchango Welcome to the freeconomy!
    • Freally An online community that help you save money and environment.
  • Used Electronics
  • Swap Sites for Books/Media
  • Swap Sites f0r Baby Goods/Toys
    • Toyswap Swap, Buy, and Sell New and Gently Used Toys
    • Thredup Just Like a Consignment Shop – But All Online!
    • Kinderado (formerly Tauschteddy) Second hand children’s clother for parents. From parents.
  • Clothing Swaps
  • Pets
    • Rover Find your perfect dog sitter
    • Dogvacay Board your dog in a real home
  • Education/Language
    • EduFire A social learning community
    • Udemy Udemy helps students make moves
    • Myngle Language lessons that come to you
    • Glovico A social network where people from developing countries can offer their services as language teachers
    • Livemocha Creating a world without barriers

Summary and Next Steps
This trend is just getting started. Expect many traditional business models to be disrupted as these startups and large companies adopt new methods for deploying and consuming goods and services. Don’t expect more than 20% of these startups to survive as categories will expand and collapse in the traditional innovation market. I’ll keep a continued focus on this market trend over the coming future, please leave a comment with your thoughts and submissions.