All about bicycles, electric-assisted bikes, technology and safety in the press

The most common safety risks that we come across in our daily work around bicycle safety, technology and operating instructions are also published by us in articles in the leading German special-interest magazines TOUR (Europe's road bike magazine no. 1), BIKE (Europe's mountain bike magazine no. 1), MYBIKE and EMTB in order to make this information, which is important for the industry, available to a wider public.

For many years now, the Eurobike Show Daily, trade fair magazine of the annual Eurobike Show, has also given us the opportunity to publish our view of major developments in the cycle industry in full-page articles.

We also speak regularly in independent expert presentations about all areas of bicycle technology and the bicycle market. In addition, we are quoted by further special-interest magazines of the industry and the trade as well as increasingly by radio and television in their media reports, which shows us that we are spot on with our advice. The section "News" informs you about the latest news from our specialist areas. The reports and publications of this section are listed chronologically or according to areas of interest.

RadMarkt 04/2012
Reading time 1:45 minutes

Dirk Zedler: New players on the e-market

The e-bike market develops at such a rapid pace that it attracts even participants from other sectors. Therefore the bicycle expert Dirk Zedler fears a basic change of the balance of power and has gathered for this purpose a few data.

In doing so he subsumes groups with divergent interests under the general term "offender": The automotive economy with the intention to sell e-bikes, the energy companies aiming at cultivating their image, the testers and certifiers hoping for a service business prescribed by the legislator (without having the expert knowledge), and the insurers invoking the accident potential of e-bikes on the basis of their business interest.

With regard of the automotive industry Zedler compared staff and turnover figures of companies from the bicycle and the automotive sector – with foreseeable result and an interesting assortment (with Ford, without Pon). But what do these figures indicate in fact? When provoking such scenarios, it is often pretended that the large groups would throw money around, to invade small sectors without any calculation of profitability at all.

Zedler's to-do-list includes well-known elements: Lobby work, unity, professionalization. But how much room is there still for improvement? Is the often heard assumption of the missing systematic lobby work correct at all? There is presumably more than there is known in general; the selective communication behind closed doors is often the most effective one. What is however correct, is Zedler’s statement with regard to the automotive lobby’s capability to get their hands on the funds supporting e-mobility.

Professionalization can be continued, but the huge advances in development have already taken place, says Zedler, who sees the cycle sector in branches like carbon far ahead of BMW and others. As concerns unity, it is above all the patent disputes between Canyon and Cervélo that annoy Zedler: "It only makes the lawyers richer and blow resources you could use much more reasonable." In this point, he is right; Apple and Samsung are doing just the same and are successful nevertheless; but they can afford it.

Author: Michael Bollschweiler

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