(Yicai) Dec. 21 -- Serial Chinese entrepreneur Dai Wei, the founder of China’s one-time bicycle-sharing giant Ofo, may be facing a second business failure. This time with his US coffee chain venture.

About Time Coffee, which Dai set up last year, had five boba coffee shops in New York City as of this May. But now just one remains open on Madison Avenue, according to mobile mapping apps.

The chain’s Instagram account has more than 14,000 followers and 63 posts, but the last one was published on Sept. 29.

Dai, 32, is not involved in About Time Coffee’s day-to-day operations, but he helped put together its team and set up meetings with investors, according to earlier reports. The startup's investors are IDG Capital's Chinese arm, ZhenFund, and Will Hunting Capital, all of which also put money into Ofo, which failed.

Since the Covid-19 pandemic, Dai has been working in China and the United States, first founding a mobile power rental startup in Seattle and then About Time Coffee in New York, according to people familiar with the matter.

Dai is subject to 41 types of Chinese court-imposed restrictions on consumption, with the latest added on Oct. 12, according to corporate data platform Tianyancha. Seven of Dai's 12 businesses are still up and running and one of them owes CNY540 million (USD75.6 million) due to contract disputes. A large number of Ofo’s users were left with unrefunded deposits after its failure.

Editors: Shi Yi, Emmi Laine