The Alibaba-backed bike sharing start-up Ofo has "immense" cash flow problems - that's according to a report in the Financial Times.

The firm has also considered applying for bankruptcy.

Ofo's founder Dai Wei shared his conerns in a letter to employees, the FT reported.

“I’ve thought countless times . . . of even dissolving the company and applying for bankruptcy,” he said.

“For the whole of this year we’ve borne immense cash flow pressure. Returning deposits to users, paying debts to suppliers, in order to keep the company running we have to turn every renminbi into three.”

Ofo launched in 2014 and has operations across the world, with schemes in the UK, Australia, China, France, India, Italy, Spain and Russia.