For those Invested. G Dear MOBU Angel Investor I like many of you started this MOBU journey late in 2018 during an inspiring presentation by Gary Turner at BST in Northriding. Full of optimism and excitement, I duly paid to secure my 1 in 50 bike like no other. After all, these guys were masters of the composite world and had all of the answers to the questions that I didn’t even know existed. That is where our paths diverged somewhat, as I was equally intrigued by PYGA Mountain Bikes and subsequently decided to invest into the business in January 2019. I am still invested directly in my 1 of 50 MOBU’s, which might seem counter-intuitive to some, but how often does one get to grab a piece of history? Our cumulative investment remains firmly rooted and entrenched in South Africa and we set about to further increase our relevance to the world of Mountain Biking by bringing more of our manufacturing back home. We established and commissioned our own Aluminium Factory in Maritzburg. Given Pat’s history with designing and manufacturing iconic mountain bikes, this was a no brainer. The MOBU project continued as per our bulletins with slow but steady progress. We kept reiterating that had the process been followed in the East, we would have still been in commercial negotiation phase. By October of 2019, the first prototype front triangle was completed. By December, the first full bicycle was available and was ridden by our taller colleagues resulting in incredible feedback. It was at this point, that between PYGA and BST, we decided to push to have the PYGA EuroSteel Teams of Philip Buys/ Matthys Beukes and Philimon Sebona/ Pieter du Toit race the ABSA Cape Epic on MOBU’s, this required 4 team bikes plus 2 spares. The team had so much confidence in the prototype bikes, that they immediately committed to riding every possible event on the new platform. Their initial feedback was that the MOBU was incredibly fast, planted, agile and nimble. It climbed and descended like a beast. In short, the overall view was that this was the best bike that they had ever ridden. Bear in mind that Phil Buys was Nino Schurter’s team mate in the ABSA Cape Epic in 2015, so that is not an empty statement by any stretch of the imagination. The first race of the season was the Attakwas Extreme Mountain Bike Challenge which saw Matthys Beukes take a very respectable 2nd place, fighting his way back from a bleak 20th position after the 2ndwater table. Then came Tankwa Trek, arguably the best preparation race that exists for The ABSA CAPE EPIC, we achieved 4th position and the first South African pairing. Philip Buys then went on to win the Imbuko Big 5. The teams preparation was looking superb, however as we all know now, COVID-19 struck a death blow to The ABSA Cape EPIC and business in South Africa. We had planned roadshows to the Western Cape and KZN in March and April. These were unfortunately rendered impossible by the State of Disaster that was declared by President Ramaphosa. The decision to push for the ABSA Cape Epic, in hindsight was probably not the best one, particularly given that the event was unceremoniously cancelled, however had it taken place, we truly believe that our boys would have put PYGA and the MOBU firmly on the map, thus further entrenching the value of the initial 50. Alas, this was not meant to be and we were forced to contend with the next 6 months of challenges with the new normal. Work continued at BST, which gave rise to 5 more variants to the initial attempts. Please note that each iteration is cut by hand and layed up by hand which takes about four weeks per iteration. This was done in a factory environment that was only allowed to operate at 20% capacity as dictated by the State of Disaster regulations. Despite the multiple setbacks that this project has suffered, the Department of Trade and Industry adjudicated that our project was substantial enough to qualify for the Support Program for industrial innovation and released the first payment on Monday the 12th October 2020 for the successful completion of project milestones. We now have 13 prototyped frames, 7 of which are completely unique, essentially constituting a completely new build. The advances and developments might seem marginal to the naked eye, but we could write a thesis on each one. Needless to say, with more slow and steady progress, we finally dialled in on lucky number 13. This then kicked off the real work, digitizing the cutting files, all 13 previous editions had been cut by hand, your bike will be cut on a computerized cutting table. Other parallel tasks included finalizing the ply book from Quality Assurance and replicability perspective, training up the commercial team for lay-up, building of the finishing and painting jigs etc. All of the above work has been done on the Large frame. The Medium and Extra Large will have to be modified from the Large, which involves lengthening/ reducing the Top Tube, Seat Tube, Head Tube and Down Tube layups, cutting files and ply books as well as intensifier molds per size. We certainly have our work cut out for us and are fully committed to the successful completion of this amazing project. We are acutely aware of the fact that we are almost a year late and that we have not communicated in the best possible manner. We have been dealing with many unknowns, but have consistently fought for and achieved improvements to the end product. As testament to this fact, the PYGA EuroSteel have achieved three wins from three starts in the Trailseeker series, which also included a 1, 2 and 3 at Buffelsdrift. It is our sincere desire to give firm and concrete timelines with regard to the ultimate delivery date of your new weapon. We believe that by the end of next week we should be in a position to provide these timelines, as BST would have by then completed the first commercially produced MOBU according to the finalized formula (Lucky #13). We are planning events in Gauteng, KZN and the Western Cape and hope to be able to take you through the progress personally with the different iterations as well as the final product. Finally, please accept my personal apology for the lack of clear communication during this period and please accept my heartfelt thanks for your patience and continued support, not to mention you faith in us as a company. Best regards
