Even chip shortages and supply-chain snafus haven’t stopped the Pyrenees-worthy ascent of e-bikes, whose gross sales are leaving conventional bikes of their mud. If extra proof have been wanted that e-bikes and micromobility are a cool protection for a toasting planet, think about this: Porsche, the venerable sports-car purveyor, lately acquired a majority stake in Greyp. That’s the Croatian e-bike firm based by 33-year-old Mate Rimac, the electric-car wunderkind and CEO of the newly shaped Bugatti Rimac, of which Porsche holds a 45-percent share.
Greyp (pronounced “grape”) isn’t seeking to be the two-wheeled analog of the $2.4 million, almost 2,000-horsepower Rimac Nevera hypercar, in response to firm CEO Krešimir Hlede. Yet the corporate’s high-end choices, ranging from round $7,000, are related expertise flagships, designed to assist Greyp promote its digital know-how to different bike producers; simply as Rimac is supplying EV tech to Aston Martin and Koenigsegg, and creating a high-performance EV for Hyundai.
“We do have bikes in our name, but we’re not a bike company,” Hlede says of his vertically built-in outfit. Among 50 staff in Greyp R&D, solely 4 work on the bodily bikes themselves. And the corporate has bought solely about 2,000 bikes since 2019, almost all in Europe, with about 1,200 pre-ordered for 2022.
Think of Greyps as smartphones or PlayStations with pedals, and Android/iOS apps as their nerve facilities.
“We’re never going to sell 100,000 bikes, because then we’d become a competitor to our own customers,” Hlede says.
So what’s the firm as much as in Sveta Nedelja, close to Rimac’s manufacturing unit on the outskirts of Zagreb? Greyp touts its creations as the primary absolutely linked e-bikes. They’re designed to meld the digital and actual worlds, and get individuals huffing and puffing within the course of.
Extravagantly styled fashions just like the Greyp G6 (ranging from about $8,000) are full of sensors, 4G eSim modules and GPS; twin 1080/30fps cameras, telemetry and rider information; distant anti-theft options and real-time gamification. Think of Greyps as smartphones or PlayStations with pedals, and Android/iOS apps as their nerve facilities.
That linked philosophy already will get on the nerves of some old-school riders, who see biking as a blessed escape from display screen time, and a option to tune into one’s pure environment. But firm execs and engineers as a substitute see a aggressive edge.
Certainly, Greyp’s bikes don’t skimp on prime {hardware}. The G6 is a full-suspension mountain bike with such goodies as a T700 carbon body, Formula Selva fork, Formula Cura disc brakes, SRAM drivetrain and Schwalbe tires. A mid-drive motor by MDF, up to date with Greyp firmware, outputs a nominal 250 watts of pedal-assisted energy (450 watts peak), with a 700 watt-hour battery.
“If our bike puts a smile on your face, and our competitor doesn’t, we win.”
—Krešimir Hlede, CEO, Greyp
Yet Hlede says the world’s e-bike giants all draw from the identical cabinets of acquainted, largely interchangeable {hardware}—frames and forks, derailleurs, batteries and motors—from suppliers similar to Shimano and SRAM, Yamaha and Bosch. Regulations restrict most velocity and energy, and sensible limitations in battery mass make it onerous to eke out a significant edge in vary.
“In bikes, it’s difficult to be different,” Hlede says in a video interview. “We’re not creating a bike for the next Olympic champ, or the most efficient bike. You won’t hear a lot of discussion from us on range or Newton-meters, because most people honestly don’t give a damn. But if our bike puts a smile on your face, and our competitor doesn’t, we win.”
On Greyp bikes, entrance and rear mounted cameras consistently buffer motion in 20-second bites, so riders can press a button and save footage for a social put up or posterity.
A front-mounted wide-angle digicam joins a rear-mounted related system in offering Greyp e-bikes with action-capturing eyes fore and aft. Greyp
“When you see, say, a pink elephant cross the road and say, ‘I really should have recorded that,’ you’ve already got it,” Hlede says.
Another in-the-works function will let the bike acknowledge a soar or stunt in progress, and routinely load that clip onto the person’s cellphone. Using their apps and TMobile connections, riders can talk with bikes remotely to snap nonetheless pictures or handle features.
“All of a sudden you have a bike you can take from point A to point B, but one that will also create content, make decisions for you, provide a gaming platform and communicate with other bikes or infrastructure.”
—Krešimir Hlede
If a rider tumbles right into a ditch or encounters an emergency, the bike can routinely dial for help, as with cell-connected providers in automobiles. Owners might be alerted if somebody strikes or makes off with their dear bike, and monitor and even disable the Greyp solely. A battery cost takes about 5 hours. But a hidden, secondary battery maintains a connection for as much as six months if the principle battery is depleted or eliminated, in response to firm engineers Robert Gotal and Saša Počuča.
Onboard sensors seize dozens of telemetry information units, together with hill gradients, g-forces, rpm cadence, or a rider’s bodily energy output and coronary heart fee. That coronary heart monitor can alter the bike’s power-assist stage accordingly, or to match a preset exercise schedule. As with auto racing software program, customers can analyze their rides in granular element to enhance their abilities or alter coaching regimens. Gamification options let riders compete with one another—and doubtlessly “players” in different areas—over GPS-linked programs, capturing flags or looking for excessive scores in time, velocity or bodily output.
Greyp
“All of a sudden you have a bike you can take from point A to point B, but one that will also create content, make decisions for you, provide a gaming platform and communicate with other bikes or infrastructure,” Hlede says.
Several of Greyp’s digital options are on the modern new Storck Cyklaer, an progressive, light-weight e-bike made in a partnership between Greyp, Storck Bicycles, Porsche Digital and Fazua, the German drive practice maker. That bike additionally lets riders take away each the battery and motor after they don’t take care of help, significantly lightening the load.
Hlede believes that linking bikes to the phone-and-internet world will solely increase the game’s reputation; he cites an general 40 % rise in e-bike gross sales in Europe in 2021, 140 % within the United States, and the Far East’s longtime apply of transferring by cities on two wheels.
“This is absolutely something that can happen in the Western world. My mother is 70, and all of a sudden, this allows her to ride a bike,” Hlede says.
“My own traditional mountain bike has been collecting dust for five years,” he continues. “Going up a hill is no longer a pleasure, but a punishment. Without an e-bike, I wouldn’t go for a weekend ride, but now I will.”