Taipei Cycle D&I Awards hand accolades to 38 bike industry innovations

The annual Taipei Cycle D&I Awards have taken place, with 38 bike industry lines taking gongs, six of which now hold the gold accolade.

Delivered in tandem with a press conference discussing a challenging 12 months for the bike industry, Ms. Leonor F. M. Lin, President & CEO, Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA) gave detail on how Taiwan’s exports business has supported the industry.

In her opening remarks, Ms. Lin’s discussed how Taiwan’s e-Bike exports in particular have been the biggest driving force for industry growth this past year, with an overall value almost as high as that of complete bikes.

Exports grew by 18% in volumes and 14% in value from 2019 to 2020. This equates to 760,000 units of E-Bikes exported in 2020 worth 987 million USD. Top export markets for E-Bikes last year in terms of units sold were the Netherlands (41.08%), the US (22.08%), Germany (6.17%) and the UK (4.69%)

Chosen from 110 submissions from ten countries the winners consisted of a number of new e-Bike innovations, as well as a range of products selected for maturity in design integration and a smart user experience.

The six winners of the gold award were:

• REACTO TEAM-E Aero Bike – Merida Industry Co., Ltd
• Cadex Boost Saddle – Cadex & Giant Group
• Liv Tropic Collection Cycling Gear – Liv & Giant Group
• Votani H3 E-Bike – Darfon Innovation Corp.
• Gmigo One Smart E-Bike – Tianjin Jidian Road Technology Co., Ltd.
• TA: e-Bike Twilight – Litemove Technology Co, Ltd. & IDS Corporations Ltd. (Winner of the Gold Award Young Enterprise 2021)

This year’s award-winning products were chosen by Georg Todtenbier (CRE8 DESIGN, Taipei), Johann Geiger (Dayeh University, Changhua), Ken O’Rourke (KOR-DESIGN, Taichung), Moses Hu (VanMoof, Taipei), Debbie Huang (PEGA D&E, Taipei), Edward Chiang (CYD Innovation Co., Ltd., Taichung) and Francois Liang (Cycling & Health Tech Industry R&D Center, Taichung).

The judges assessed the entries with their seasoned experience and through intense discussions on the basis of the following criteria: innovation and elaboration, functionality, aesthetics, responsibility and positioning.

The judging group commented of this year’s awards: “The impact of the pandemic has caused significant changes in the bicycle industry in 2020. It can be seen from the entries in this year that the effort and energy put into innovative research and new product development have no longer focused on sports, competition or leisure, but tapped into the needs of various groups, such as commuting, cargo, etc. In addition, the creative process in product development also begins to shift from discovering and solving problems to focusing more on lowering the threshold and offer better user experience and narrowing the distance between the product and the user, which should be very much encouraged.”

E-Bikes will feature prominently in the upcoming TAIPEI CYCLE Online Show, scheduled to take place March 3 – March 31. The physical show has, for the time being, been postponed.