Jan-Willem van Schaik

TAIPEI, Taiwan - In the first half of this year, Taiwan increased its e-bike exports to 410,000 units or 21%. Export values of e-bikes reached NT$523 billion, on par with regular bikes which stood at NT$583 billion.

EINDHOVEN, the Netherlands - Shimano's second-generation e-MTB system comes with a full line of features. The component manufacturer targets the EP8 for a wide range including premium mountain biking and competition racing to trail riding, cross-country, casual MTB, trekking and off-road adventuring. However, when the new drive system will be available to the market is still unknown.

BRUSSELS, Belgium - Eurostat import figures for the first four months of 2020 clearly point to the fact that the impact of COVID-19 on e-bike imports in the EU-27 countries is limited to a small decline of less than 3%. Notwithstanding the supply chain constraints and even order cancellations, these latest statistics once again mark the importance of the e-bike for the industry.

BRUSSELS, Belgium - In contrast to the e-bike imports into the European Union, the bicycle imports declined significantly during the period January - May this year. The total import volume dropped by more than 15% from 2,577,256 units in 2019 to 2,181,239 this year. Taiwan's focus on e-bikes has a big impact on the top-ranking positions of bicycle exporting countries to the European Union. In line with last year's trends, China's export volumes to the EU-27 continues to increase.

SCHIPHOL, the Netherlands - Yamaha's announcement to start coordinating its European OEM e-bike business from its EU head office in the Netherlands last May was already expected much earlier. In the nineties Yamaha was one of the pioneers on the e-bike market, but after a few less successful attempts in Europe, the company focused on the local market.

MILTON KEYNES, UK - The advantages of production close to the market became more than obvious for e-bike manufacturer Volt. In the middle of the COVID-19 crisis the company which was founded in 2010, opened its planned UK facility in Milton Keynes. As a result the founding brothers James and Lyle Metcalfe, saw a huge up-take of their planned production.

FRANKFURT a.M, Germany - Europe's biggest conference and exhibition for battery technology has again announced new dates for the annual Battery Experts Forum. Initially planned for last spring, it was subsequently moved to autumn due to the pandemic and now to April 2021.

GENT, Belgium - The take-over by supermarket owner Colruyt in 2019 saved the future of the Belgium bicycle retail chain Fiets!. A year earlier Fiets! already filed for chapter 11 and that was not without reason. According to a publication in Belgium newspaper De Tijd, Colruyt had to invest another €10 million in Fiets! to make it future proof.

VELKE ORVIŠTĚ, Slovakia - "After more than 20 years, we are going to get rid of the high fragility of standard resin carbon composites, by introducing a new generation material," said Kellys Bicycles CEO Michal Divinec at the presentation of the company's MY 2021 range. The Slovakian company partnered with Belgium frame manufacturer Rein4ced for the introduction of their new e-bike frames for the Theos F series.

FRIEDRICHSHAFEN, Germany - 'Mobility 2025', 'green tail wind for bicycles' and 'bike biz 2025' are the three themes of the conference during this year's Eurobike Digital Days. The three topics selected by Eurobike for their conference reflect the impact of COVID-19 on the industry. The online conference is scheduled for September 1.