News + Trends

Bling-bling bikes, foldable helmets and bike chains for football fans - my highlights of the Taipei Cycle Show

17.3.2016

Translation: machine translated

The Taipei Cycle Show is the largest and most prestigious bike show in Asia, and a very good place to track down new products and innovations in the bike sector. I visited the show for two days at the beginning of March and present my personal highlights here.

At the 29th edition of Taipei Cycle, over 1,000 exhibitors presented their new cycling products at over 3,000 stands covering more than 58,000 square metres, including top brands such as Santa Cruz, Shimano, Schwalbe and Giant. According to the press release, over 8,300 international visitors attended the trade fair, the vast majority of whom came from China, Japan, South Korea, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines, Australia, the USA and Germany.

Tern - Folding bikes on the rise!

Folding bikes are already hugely popular in Asia due to the many congested metropolises. These bikes can be folded up in no time at all and can then be taken on public transport or to work almost like a handbag. The Taipei Cycle was full of folding bikes in a wide variety of designs. I was particularly impressed by a cargo folding bike from Tern, to which additional bags can be attached for stowing and transport. In addition to folding bikes, Tern now also produces urban bikes - which you may also find on Galaxus in the future.

Many new products for Velo accessories

Novelties were mainly in the bike accessories sector, including an electronic gearstick for mountain bikes from Microshift, Chosen's Doz gearstick with 12 sprockets and the WTB road bike tyre in plus size format. Abus presented a classy bike lock for nostalgic and stylish cyclists, the Abus Bordo Centium, and the innovative Neo Smart roller trainer, the world's first with a genuine direct drive, was also very popular. Morpher presented a helmet that can be folded to the smallest size, for which the manufacturer even won an award at the trade fair. Shimano presented a new drive group called Metrea at the trade fair, which is specially designed for urban bikes.

Colours, flags and lots of glitter

Football fans also got their money's worth at Taipei Cycle and were able to get in the mood for the upcoming European Championships with a racing bike from Gios in the colours of Italy and bicycle chains from Patriot in the colours of various national flags. The beach cruisers from Low Rider in Harley Davidson style and with a glittery look also attracted the attention of many trade fair visitors.

The coolest product of the fair for me

I was most impressed by the new bike pedal from Connected Cycle, which was also honoured with a trade fair award. It is the world's first bike pedal that continuously measures and records your route, speed, climbs and calories burned on every bike ride. You can then view and analyse the statistics via PC or smartphone.

The highlight at the end of an exciting but exhausting two-day visit to the trade fair was a sip of original Taiwanese beer - which, to my surprise, didn't taste too bad.