The former leading player in shared mobility has encountered growth challenges. In 2025, Dida Inc's (HKEX: 02559) revenue dropped from 7.87 billion in 2024 to 5.02 billion, a significant contraction. Its primary revenue source is its carpooling business, an efficient yet singular income structure.

Fortunately, the company remained profitable, reporting a full-year 2025 adjusted net profit of 138 million.

Thanks to its capital-light model, Dida Inc's carpooling business maintains high gross margins, reaching 67.2% in the first half of 2025, which is eight times that of Caocao Chuxing. This is a key reason it has sustained profitability amid industry-wide pressure. However, despite high margins, the company still faces the challenge of achieving scalable growth.

Regarding customer acquisition, when competing against rivals with more robust ecosystems, especially giants using cash-burning strategies for user acquisition, Dida Inc, lacking a traffic advantage, still needs more cost-effective channels to attract users.

A potential solution to Dida Inc's growth issue has recently emerged. On June 29, 2026, Dida Inc and Tongcheng Travel jointly announced that Tongcheng Travel had initiated a voluntary conditional general cash offer to acquire Dida Inc. The announcement indicated that five major shareholders of Dida Inc had signed irrevocable undertakings to accept the offer, representing approximately 53.70% of the company's issued share capital.

The market views this as Dida Inc not only welcoming a new major shareholder but also finally securing a stable and cost-effective user acquisition channel, addressing its disadvantage in competing for resources against larger players.

This transaction provides an opportunity for the market to re-evaluate Dida Inc's potential.

Profitability Under Pressure

In 2025, Dida Inc delivered a mixed financial report: full-year revenue of 502 million, down 36.3% year-over-year; adjusted net profit of 138 million, down 34.7%.

Despite a revenue drop of over one-third, the company remained profitable. In a sector characterized by high investment and widespread losses, these figures at least demonstrate that Dida Inc's business model is viable and its operational foundation remains solid. However, as competitors opted for low-price subsidies, Dida Inc lost competitiveness in terms of user traffic.

Profitability stems from Dida Inc's unique operating model. Unlike other platforms, it does not own vehicles or hire drivers; it solely facilitates transactions by connecting private car owners already planning trips with passengers heading in the same direction. This model results in relatively low platform transaction costs and less pressure from subsidies.

The cost advantage from this structure is most evident in gross margin. Specifically, in the first half of 2025, the gross margin for Dida Inc's carpooling business was 67.2%, compared to 19.2% for Didi and only 8.4% for Caocao Chuxing. Dida Inc's margin was eight times that of Caocao.

Consequently, Dida Inc exhibits stronger profit resilience.

The financial report shows that as of the end of 2025, Dida Inc held approximately 1.841 billion in cash and various financial assets, with a gearing ratio of only 27.88% and no interest-bearing debt. The adjusted net profit margin was 27.5%, slightly up from 26.8% in 2024, indicating sustained core profitability.

Carpooling is inherently a cost-sharing, mutual-aid activity. Drivers do not pick up rides primarily to earn money, nor do passengers choose it solely for low cost. This means Dida Inc's model is naturally built on genuine travel demand, not on having to subsidize orders.

Subsidy data supports this view. A report from consultancy Frost & Sullivan shows that from 2021 to 2023, the total amount of driver subsidies and passenger rewards on Dida Inc's platform accounted for only 1.8% of its total transaction value, compared to an industry average of 16.7%.

Dida Inc has remained profitable for seven consecutive years, proving the feasibility of a pure facilitation model and its own operational stability. However, this does not mean the platform can continue indefinitely.

Over the past few years, Dida Inc's overall gross margin has declined from 80% in 2021 to 66% in 2025, falling for five consecutive years. This indicates that while the business itself is healthy, its growth momentum is insufficient, and Dida Inc must find new growth drivers.

Dida Inc's business model remains viable, and operations are stable. It is not short on time, but rather a new engine for growth.

The Cost of Independence

Data shows that as of the end of 2025, Dida Inc had accumulated over 415 million registered users and approximately 21 million certified private car owners. The platform lacks neither demand nor supply; the issue is that a significant portion of this potential demand has not converted into actual orders.

The carpooling transaction model, while seemingly just matching supply and demand, is influenced by three key factors: user scale, trust, and benefit distribution.

Scale drives demand, trust enables orders, and benefits attract drivers. While Dida Inc's trust system and benefit distribution mechanisms have been robust, the problem lies at the user traffic level.

In contrast, rivals like Hello, Didi, and Gaode each possess their own traffic-entrance scenarios that can feed users into their carpooling services. Dida Inc has long operated more like an independent platform, requiring users to actively seek it out, with almost no natural traffic flow.

For Hello, 34% of its users simultaneously use both its bike-sharing and ride-hailing services, with a conversion rate from bike users to ride-hailing services as high as 63.2%. It's natural for a user who rides a Hello bike to the subway daily to open the same app for a carpool on weekends.

Gaode follows a similar logic. After aggressively entering the market in 2024 with a zero-commission strategy, it embedded ride-hailing functions directly into its navigation page, allowing users to book a ride immediately after checking their route.

Didi, of course, has long built a complete mobility ecosystem covering every step from departure to the last mile.

The first phase of the mobility industry relied on bidding and subsidies; the next phase is about ecosystem competition. Hello has bike-sharing, Gaode leverages map navigation—each winner is doing the same thing: embedding carpooling into users' existing life scenarios.

As competition continues to import users through ecosystems, Dida Inc's large user pool faces limitations in scaling growth, making it difficult to compete against the prevailing trend.

Dida Inc's management has recognized this. Since the second half of last year, the platform has successively launched an aggregated ride-hailing service and begun exploring used car transaction lead-generation business.

Dida Inc founder Song Zhongjie stated during an earnings call: "Carpooling travel is primarily based on pre-scheduled demand, but Dida Inc has observed a gradual increase in users' real-time travel needs. Therefore, we are using the aggregated platform to meet this demand and improve user travel experience and fulfillment rates."

CFO Jiang Zhenyu was more direct, stating that future growth would come from deep cooperation with third-party platforms.

The crux is clear, and the solution has been identified. Dida Inc lacks not fundamentals, but an opportunity for the market to re-evaluate its value. Tongcheng Travel's entry provides precisely that opportunity.

A Moment for Reassessment

The aforementioned announcement indicates that this acquisition is not aimed at taking Dida Inc private. Upon completion of the transaction, Tongcheng Travel intends to maintain Dida Inc's listing status on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.

The market sees Tongcheng Travel's acquisition offer as heralding a moment for the re-evaluation of Dida Inc's intrinsic value. This is because, even before the deal's finalization, Dida Inc's own business had undergone several rounds of internal and external reinforcement.

At the macro level, policy clarification has provided greater certainty for the carpooling industry. The Supreme People's Court, through several gazette cases and nationwide unified adjudication guidelines, has clarified that carpooling does not constitute road transport business activity, meaning private cars do not need commercial operation permits. This opens the door to market supply.

Internally at Dida Inc, the user base continues to expand. In 2025, despite declining revenue, the platform's registered users increased by approximately 20 million against the trend to 415 million; certified private car owners grew to 21 million, covering 366 cities. New car owners are also joining at an accelerating pace, with the proportion of certified vehicles under one year old increasing nearly sevenfold compared to six years ago. Full-year transaction value reached 4.679 billion, with 80.9 million orders, indicating the transaction base remains solid.

Simultaneously, Dida Inc's own matching efficiency is improving. After launching its station-based carpooling feature, 60% of its drivers have enabled route-sharing, handling approximately 7.5 million monthly commuting trips, with commuting efficiency improving for three consecutive years.

These factors indicate that Dida Inc has not entered a negative cycle due to revenue pressure. On the contrary, it retains resilience across users, supply, and efficiency. Furthermore, Dida Inc possesses a unique moat: years of deep cultivation in carpooling have allowed it to build a comprehensive risk control system covering background checks, safety, and liability determination. This system has been validated through judicial practice. New entrants can use capital to solve traffic problems, but they cannot bypass the time cost required to establish safety and compliance capabilities.

For a long time, Dida Inc's commercial value has awaited market reassessment. Tongcheng Travel's entry undoubtedly accelerates this moment.

From a business scenario perspective, Tongcheng Travel, as an OTA platform, brings a built-in "hotel & travel + mobility" scenario. Users booking flights or hotels on its platform can seamlessly connect to carpooling services, forming a more complete travel loop. If the transaction proceeds smoothly, Dida Inc is expected to leverage Tongcheng Travel's platform resources to address its traffic短板, gaining a more stable growth pivot.

More importantly, while gaining the support of Tongcheng Travel's travel ecosystem, Dida Inc will also benefit from the traffic advantages within the broader Tencent ecosystem for travel.

On the other hand, with the introduction of Tongcheng Travel's supply chains for hotels, flights, and attractions, the value of Dida Inc's over 415 million registered users will be further unlocked. As these frequent mobility users transition from ride-hailing to booking hotels and tickets, the issue of Dida Inc's overly singular business structure will be resolved.

China's carpooling market continues to grow. Survey data shows that carpooling currently accounts for only 4.4% of the domestic passenger car transport market. Frost & Sullivan estimates the market size will increase to 103.9 billion by 2028. In this growing market, the synergy between the traffic side and the supply side can indeed create new growth opportunities for Dida Inc.

Since its inception, Dida Inc has proven the commercial feasibility of the carpooling model through its own capabilities. Having navigated a long and challenging journey while maintaining its independent platform, Dida Inc is now entering a brighter phase.