Tech

Where are the German bikes?

Written by Lance Branquinho.

· By Bike Hub Features · 106 comments

German cars are the focus of our four-wheeled desires, but where are all the German mountain bikes?

It’s the great curiosity of contemporary mountain biking, an absence of German bikes despite the crushing excellence of German mechanical engineering in relation to all other things wheeled. And it’s not a case of Germans being averse to cycling. Europe’s most populous country has abundant cycling infrastructure and commuting by pedal-powered two-wheeler is robustly encouraged by all Germans. But riding off-road? Less so.

Despite its tiny corner of amazing Alpine terrain in the extreme south-west, mountain biking is not embraced in Germany with equal opportunity – as is the case across the Rhine, in France. I’d table population density and a premium on land use as the reason. Munich, the closest of Germany’s large cities to Alpine terrain, doesn’t have nearly the trail network it should.

In and around that very same Munich, and across the Bavarian state border in Stuttgart, is perhaps the most remarkable concentration of mechanical engineering expertise in the world. A heritage of cuckoo clock precision tinkering, evolved over centuries, to its current offering of absolute domination in global automotive technology. Nobody engineers and innovates for private transport, quite as Germans do. And not merely on a grand corporate scale, either.

ccs-62657-0-47221400-1487758700.jpegNicolai frames are hand crafted in Lübbrechtsen, Germany.
ccs-62657-0-01229900-1487758700.jpeg

Much of Germany’s modern economic miracle is anchored in Mittelstand companies. Smaller enterprises, most family owned, with exceptional specialisation in technical fields and niche manufacturing. The Mittelstand companies have strategic vision provided by the world’s best technical universities and products built by some of the very best artisan system graduates. If you’ve ever seen the craftsmanship on a boutique German aluminium bike, you’d know.

They build everything. But bikes?

Why do German bike brands remain slumbering giants (pun, intended), if it’s such a wish list environment for engineering and industrial design? The domestic commuter market is immense and for most, demand has been sufficient to sustain a profitable business. But commuters are not our concern, nor are the custom bikes that German engineers have teased us with so often in the past – as vanity projects for the automotive industry.

Signalling a looming revolution, are Canyon and YT. With their disruptive direct sales business model and bikes of distinctive style – Capras aren’t mistaken for anything else – and notable innovation (Canyon’s shape-shifter geometry), the German mountain bike Blitzkrieg could be imminent.

ccs-62657-0-53989600-1487758699.jpgThe assembly line at Canyon’s factory in Koblenz.

German ingenuity in mountain biking is inarguable. SRAM’s drivetrain engineering R&D office isn’t in Schweinfurt because the beer and bacon is that much better than Colorado Springs. One by eleven. Eagle. These are examples of what SRAM’s German engineers deliver when challenged – and the justification for SRAM to have a crucial part of its business operating nine time zones away.

With a virtually inexhaustible pool of talent schooled in the fields of conceptual design and prototyping, balanced by an absurd adherence to strict testing protocols and an obsession with flawless manufacturing, why would you want to have a bike design bureau anywhere else but Germany?

Looking beyond the road

Europe is biased towards road cycling but the e-bike phenomenon has enabled an entire new pool of off-road riders to explore gradient terrain without yellow or white lines.

The demand for suspension e-bikes is enormous and that should redress some of the supply chain and strategic bias toward road bikes, which have dominated European cycling as a business ever since vélos became more sport than transport after the war. You wouldn’t principally bet against the Germans to build a pretty decent e-bike, now would you?

I hate e-bikes. What are you on about?’ European off-road e-bikes are stimulating demand for quality carbon fibre mountain bike frame design in a way unlike ever before. And in Germany, despite its lack of aviation production – ordinarily the gateway industry to downstream advanced material availability – composites have become big business.

ccs-62657-0-90721900-1487758697.jpgKiwi enduro racer Justin Leov’s Canyon Spectral.

The automotive industry, in an obsessive drive to reduce vehicle mass, is partnering with composite manufacturers or simply establishing their own carbon fibre entities. And the benefit of this will be access to superior quality composites for the German mountain bike industry. Beyond Canyon and YT, Cube and Focus, there could be a tide of new German boutique manufacturers. Highly skilled mechanical engineers, most with a background at BMW, Mercedes-Benz or Porsche, and a love of mountain biking, able to start niche composite frame building businesses.

The composite compound quality effect

Who cares about BMW carbon fibre bits, it’s not a tube, has nothing to do with bikes.’ The issue is not specific finishing, which will always be industry specific, but the supply chain of quality carbon source material. Global demand for quality source carbon is hierarchical: military, aviation, automotive. Your bicycle frame is not a first tier customer, unless it’s made by someone who weaves their own carbon, such as French brand Time.

But if you are an aspiring bike brand operating in an environment where quality carbon is available, and there are ample skills servicing Airbus or BMW composites in proximity to your office, the leveraging possibilities are phenomenal. Utah has great trails and tax incentives for business, but don’t believe for a moment Enve’s head office and manufacturing is there for only those reasons. Utah also hosts most of the United States’ strategic aviation design and the depth of skills around Salt Lake City, in composites engineering, are prodigious.

ccs-62657-0-92424400-1487758700.jpgYT Industries are building up an impress portfolio of sponsored riders, including World Cup Downhill Champion Aaron Gwin.

YT. From nowhere into desirable fringe brand. Their marketing is indisputably excellent and the current World Cup Downhill champ is on one. Beyond that, the business is run in a manner that is German in its retail cost recovery (South African exchange rate afflicted pricing notwithstanding).

Canyon’s ambition in 2017 is the US market, one never to be underestimated with the distribution and customer service demands across a territory with multiple time zones. Considering the reach of its portfolio (from road to downhill) and the ability of German businesses to absorb errors and evolve them to improvement, Canyon will surely be anointed as the vanguard global German bike brand in future; though it’s been in business for three decades.

Innovation. Precision. These are the anchors of German engineering. There isn’t a similar contamination of trends as often happens in the US industry. An upsurge of German boutique composite mountain bike brands could provide the necessary outliers we’ve been waiting for, to counter the (perceived) coercive agenda set by the current big three: Giant, Specialized and Trek. The very same brands who submarined European cycling in the 1980s with price, now have a return torpedo to deal with as YT and Canyon go Trans-Atlantic.

Competition will equal greater innovation. The tyres you ride off-road are already German. Your next bike could probably be too.

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Comments

JacoLRoux

Feb 23, 2017, 8:24 AM

World-class journalism comes to the Hub... well done Lance B!

shaper

Feb 23, 2017, 8:31 AM

No mention of Silverback which have probably been the backbone of German bikes?

Headshot

Feb 23, 2017, 8:33 AM

Trek and co are shaking in their boots!

Odinson

Feb 23, 2017, 8:40 AM

No mention of Silverback which have probably been the backbone of German bikes?

 

Are you drunk so early in the morning?

 

I haven't seen a single Silverback on the trails in almost two years of living in Europe. Yes, that's just my observation, but it's fairly telling.

Brickleberry

Feb 23, 2017, 8:41 AM

No mention of Silverback which have probably been the backbone of German bikes?

"Designed" in German made in Asia mate .

CAAD4

Feb 23, 2017, 8:43 AM

Do Germans know that Silverback is German?

shaper

Feb 23, 2017, 8:44 AM

"Designed" in German made in Asia mate .

As are most bikes these days

Nick

Feb 23, 2017, 8:45 AM

"Designed" in German made in Asia mate .

 

The designed part mostly happens in Cape Town Airport Industria.

Henryfeather

Feb 23, 2017, 8:47 AM

Is silver back not South African originated now moved to Germany? ???

Lance Cruz

Feb 23, 2017, 8:50 AM

YT has won a World Cup series. Canyon has a very extensive portfolio of product: road to DH. Hence the choice as referencing them in the main, as opposed to Silverback, which has (arguably) stronger African roots then either.

shaper

Feb 23, 2017, 8:51 AM

Are you drunk so early in the morning?

 

I haven't seen a single Silverback on the trails in almost two years of living in Europe. Yes, that's just my observation, but it's fairly telling.

Perhaps you should check their website, been around in Germany for last 45 years or so... whether they are popular or not is beside the point.... or in fact is the point of the article... where are the German bikes and why are they not popular unless bespoke.

 

Think the Silverback Sesta was/is trying to put themselves back on the map

Capricorn

Feb 23, 2017, 8:54 AM

excellent scope of researched info there. great article. thanks!

MrJacques

Feb 23, 2017, 8:56 AM

Would be fantastic if Canyon shipped to SA! 

NickGM

Feb 23, 2017, 9:11 AM

Finally a german business model for world domination that I can support!

 

What? Too soon?

Odinson

Feb 23, 2017, 9:13 AM

Perhaps you should check their website, been around in Germany for last 45 years or so... whether they are popular or not is beside the point.... or in fact is the point of the article... where are the German bikes and why are they not popular unless bespoke.

 

Think the Silverback Sesta was/is trying to put themselves back on the map

 

No. You've got your facts wrong.

 

 

In 2004 the Silverback brand was founded by Deon Retief, an entrepreneur, visionary and strategist. He has more than 22 years of experience in the bicycle industry, has conducted extensive brand studies worldwide (more than 300 brands) and has visited more than 400 independent bicycle dealers and sports retailers in more than 45 countries. Deon was born in Cape Town, South Africa and earned a degree in marketing and business economics.

 

In January 2010, Silverback Technologie GmBh was established, which now owns the Silverback trademark worldwide. Germany was established as the centre of Silverback’s global operations when the company purchased land in Stuttgart and plans for a global operations centre were drawn up. Germany remains central to the design, development and ownership of the brand in becoming a truly great company.

 

Source: https://ideamensch.com/deon-retief/

 

There are a bunch of German brands that eclipse Silverback in terms of market presence, product range, etc. YT, Radon, Canyon, Propain all have factory teams in the World Cup DH and/or World Cup XCO and/or EWS. Can the same be said of Silverback.

 

The German direct-to-sales bike brands are making a massive assault on the bike industry, forcing even cycling behemoths like Trek and Giant to offer hybrid-direct sales models in response to ze Germans.

Dan Dob

Feb 23, 2017, 9:19 AM

Great questions and well written piece!

gummibear

Feb 23, 2017, 9:27 AM

Stevens

Cube

Storck

Rose bikes

Ghost

Focus

And the odd AX-Lightness at races.

 

See them out on the roads and trails daily.

 

See more Trek ,Canyon and Giant though.

dman2

Feb 23, 2017, 9:28 AM

What about Rose bikes? They been around for 100+ years, are they not German?

Mongooser

Feb 23, 2017, 9:35 AM

Would be fantastic if Canyon shipped to SA!

Remember the cost of them...shipping is harldy the problem
Patchelicious

Feb 23, 2017, 9:48 AM

German cars are the focus of our four-wheeled desires, but where are all the German mountain bikes?

Click here to view the article

Maybe they are too busy trying to make "only one click!"
Cat2forLife

Feb 23, 2017, 9:51 AM

What about Focus? Probably one of the bigger German brands.

BLACK96

Feb 23, 2017, 10:03 AM

Don't forget Radon bikes...smaak their 10.8kg Slide Carbon 140 trail bike! 

BeegMig

Feb 23, 2017, 10:04 AM

Ulrich Bikes :ph34r:

Or did Jan give up on that venture?

Patchelicious

Feb 23, 2017, 10:06 AM

Ulrich Bikes :ph34r:

Or did Jan give up on that venture?

They were too heavy

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