Introducing the Founder’s Edition badge

Dear backers,

Thank you once again for your amazing support. It has been a really wonderful and humbling experience to see your enthusiasm for the bike. Bringing an innovative product to the market is a challenging but fulfilling process, as many components do not yet exist, and have to be custom-built rather than purchase off-the-shelf. As we’ve covered in a previous mini series post, our post-campaign work has been mainly focused on ensuring that these parts are manufacturable within our supplier’s tolerances, making minor engineering changes, and finalizing mold designs.

We’ve made significant progress in the last few months, but we have also encountered the following challenges:

Supply chain volatility

• The effects of COVID-19 lockdowns on Asian supply chains are now being felt as there are unprecented spikes in demand for e-bike components. This means that every e-bike manufacturer is in competition to grab components as fast as the factories can produce them. Thankfully a large portion of our bike is custom designed, but certain standard components are still affected by this.
• This is compounded by the unexpected spike in e-bike demand during the pandemic last year.
• Supply chains are slowly catching up, but lead times remain long.
• We will not compromise with lesser quality components.
• Some of our orders that we placed post-campaign last year are still being manufactured.
• Furthermore, we also experienced delays with some components that took a longer time to arrive than expected due to a lack of ships at the port of origin.
• Also, the Chinese New Year celebrations mean that some of our supplier factories are closed for around 2-3 weeks, further affecting lead times.

Quality challenges

• Unfortunately, some of the components shipped by a supplier did not meet our quality standards (more information in the previous update).
• We’ve already processed the return and will be expecting a new batch to arrive with better quality control.
• Travel bans are restricting our ability to personally oversee production of certain parts.
• Our commitment to quality remains steadfast, and we do not intend to rush production and ship out bikes with defects.

Further COVID-19 lockdowns at our manufacturing site in Malaysia

• The ongoing pandemic has been hitting Penang hard, with fresh lockdowns announced today.
• Manufacturing facilities are still allowed to operate, but with strict conditions leading to a slower-than-usual work progress.
• Movement is still restricted, especially for interstate travel, making it challenging to manage production at 2 locations.

In light of these challenges, it is with a heavy heart that we would like to announce that the delivery date has been pushed back to June 2021. It was a really difficult decision to make, but in the end, it came down to choosing between quality and adhering to the delivery schedule. We know that many of you have been looking forward to receiving your bikes, and the team would like to sincerely apologize for the delay. We promise that we will be doing our utmost best to deliver an amazing bike into your hands as soon as possible.

Is there any possibility for the delivery date to be earlier than June 2021?

Yes, our estimated June delivery date includes some buffer to account for unexpected delays. If the schedule goes according to plan, it is likely that an earlier delivery date is possible.

Our exclusive token of appreciation to you

As a thank you to our earliest believers (that’s you!), we are proud to introduce the Founder’s Edition badge. This badge will be engraved onto your bike at no extra cost – marking it as a limited edition. We plan to put this badge on the fork, but we are also open to suggestions in the comments section.