We are pleased to announce that three Wisper Electric bike models for sale from late 2012 will be produced in Germany. Although our relationship with our Chinese OEM manufacturers has helped Wisper to gain a strong position within the Pedelec market both in the UK and overseas, the Directors believe that as the business grows, a more stable manufacturing platform was needed.

 

We are delighted to be working with one of the largest and most highly respected bicycle manufactures in Germany with an excellent reputation for both high volume and extremely high quality bikes and “on time” deliveries. Our new German OEM partner currently manufactures many thousands of reliable electric bicycles for the German and European markets and has recently been awarded the contract to design and manufacture the much discussed SMART bike that will be sold through SMART car outlets world wide later this year.

 

The move to Germany is a part of our strategy to improve quality, reduce delivery times and facilitate our sales drive into Germany, Holland and other volume electric bike users in continental Europe. To assist in developing the market we are delighted to announce that we have recruited a new Director. Dieter Scholz until recently was Managing Director of one of the leading scooter and electric bicycle distributors in Germany. Dieter has worked in the pedal power, electric and internal combustion engined two wheeler markets for many years. Dieter’s wealth of knowledge will be a massive boost for the Wisper management team.

 

The three new German built bikes have been named the 905Classic, 705Classic and 806Classic. They are based on the very popular Wisper SE and SEL models. They will retain the powerful long-range batteries, Japanese Dapu drive systems and their distinctive looks.

 

The move back to Europe seems to be becoming a trend as more and more manufacturers realise that due to huge wage increases in China and the comparative weakness of the Euro against the Chinese Yuan the cost of producing in Europe is becoming more affordable.

 

Of course the 48.5% dumping tax on electric bikes, already charged on pedal powered bicycles which seems to be talked about more and more openly these days helped us to make this important decision.

Good luck with the change

 

I know its early days yet but any news or thoughts on pricing

 

Alan

Hi Alan,

 

The bikes will not be as highly specified as the SEL or Alpino range but will be more highly speced than the se and fe bikes so the price will fall almost exactly be between the two ranges. The folding bike will have the same electronics as the Alpino but will sport a Nexus hub gear rather than the Alfine and will not have a hollow tech crank set-up.

 

All the best

 

David

I can imagine this had been very challenging indeed David.......no wonder you have been kept busy.

 

Does this mean that the Wisper range is now going to be reduced to just those three models ?

 

Or will you still continue producing some others in China ?

I do feel a bit wary of buying something that might be discontinued soon.

 

If some of the parts are still coming from China as you said before, surely this will still create a problem for delivery times ?

 

As a matter of interest, I understood that the Dapu motor is manufactured in China ...not Japan ?

 

Are the wage increases so large in China that they have become more expensive than those in Germany ? If so, we had better look out for some huge price increases in most e-bikes, it seems strange though, and even allowing for reduced freight charges, I would have thought wages in Germany would still be substantially higher and would mean that the price of your new german built bikes will rise significantly ?

 

Hope not, as it seems to me that lots of different makes of e- bikes have started to get really expensive recently.

 

I hope you will still be running Wisper and that it wont ever become totally German owned as I know you have put a lot of hard work into building your brand over the last few years.

 

I know I can hardly talk, as I own 2 Mercedes vehicles, but if labour costs and delivery times were becoming such a problem in China, would it not have been a possibility to relocate back to the UK rather than Germany ?

 

It would be so lovely to get more bikes produced in the UK.....now that I WOULD be willing to pay a premium price for

 

Sorry for all the questions David, but I find it fascinating to hear about such an enormous upheaval in your business and the interesting reasons behind it..... I hope it all works out well for you.

 

Lynda

I've read somewhere that there's a new Wisper offroad bike named the MX.

Has the Nuvinci drive too.

True, or did I dream that?

Looks really nice if it is in the pipeline

Are the wage increases so large in China that they have become more expensive than those in Germany ? If so, we had better look out for some huge price increases in most e-bikes,

 

Lynda

 

Bike Europe last week carried the news that price increases of at least 10% were expected in China from the end of this year. Once the import duty from China is added, plus the possibility of an anti-dumping tax on e-bikes, the low transport costs and minimal import bureaucracy from within Europe, Germany starts to look a very attractive place to make e-bikes. Their high quality control standards and the customer appeal of German quality manufacture can be a real clincher.

Hi Lynda and thanks for your interest,

 

I have cut and pasted your questions so I can answer them individually.

 

Does this mean that the Wisper range is now going to be reduced to just those three models ?

 

Yes Lynda, for the UK we will be selling three bikes in the classic Wisper range the 905Classic, 705Classic and 806Classic. We have a separate range for Germany which we may start to sell in the UK if we feel the demand is there.

 

I do feel a bit wary of buying something that might be discontinued soon.

 

We have a very strong and well know policy of never letting customers down, indeed we still hold in stock batteries and components for all the bikes we have ever produced going back 8 years. Please rest assured the Chinese bikes will continue to be supported for many years to come.

 

If some of the parts are still coming from China as you said before, surely this will still create a problem for delivery times?

 

Our biggest problem is getting hold of components such as Shimano, the parts we have made specially for us such as battery cases, connections and frames have never been a problem.

 

As a matter of interest, I understood that the Dapu motor is manufactured in China ...not Japan?

 

You are correct the motors we use are assembled in Pu Dong, however many of the components come in from Japan and most importantly the factory in China is owned and managed by the Japanese, this makes a massive difference in terms of lead time and quality control.

 

Are the wage increases so large in China that they have become more expensive than those in Germany ? If so, we had better look out for some huge price increases in most e-bikes, it seems strange though, and even allowing for reduced freight charges, I would have thought wages in Germany would still be substantially higher and would mean that the price of your new german built bikes will rise significantly ?

 

Hope not, as it seems to me that lots of different makes of e- bikes have started to get really expensive recently.

 

No the wages are not as high as in Germany, however the way the bikes are built in Germany is far more efficient than in China, so the labour time on each bike is massively reduced. For example in China, most wheels are spoked by individuals, then the wheels are balanced automatically. The factory we are working with in Germany make all their wheels completely automatically, the machines, invented by our new supplier, cost more than a million pounds each and they have six of them. Each machine has 4 cameras inside so they can watch and record each process, amazing!

 

I hope you will still be running Wisper and that it wont ever become totally German owned as I know you have put a lot of hard work into building your brand over the last few years.

 

Douglas and I still own Wisper 100%, although we may sell shares to our new German Director at a later date. The company will remain in UK, and I hope to work with Wisper into my seventies at least!

 

I know I can hardly talk, as I own 2 Mercedes vehicles, but if labour costs and delivery times were becoming such a problem in China, would it not have been a possibility to relocate back to the UK rather than Germany ? It would be so lovely to get more bikes produced in the UK.....now that I WOULD be willing to pay a premium price for

 

If only we could. We did think about setting up a factory here but there is absolutely no assistance available. I even had meetings with the Minister for Transport to discuss just this but it seems there is no interest. An top of this, I used to own a light engineering factory in Woolwich employing 60 people. Would I ever do that again? Absolutely not, I enjoy marketing, designing and being involved with the nitty gritty far too much to start filling in forms and generally becoming an HR manager again.

 

All the best and thanks again for your interest Lynda!

 

David

I've read somewhere that there's a new Wisper offroad bike named the MX.

Has the Nuvinci drive too.

True, or did I dream that?

Looks really nice if it is in the pipeline

 

Hi Fordulike,

 

Yes you are correct, the new Grace MX is made by the same factory who will be making the new Wispers.

 

We will be showing the bike at the NEC and will have full details on our web pages before the show.

 

All the best

 

David

Hi Fordulike,

 

Yes you are correct, the new Grace MX is made by the same factory who will be making the new Wispers.

 

We will be showing the bike at the NEC and will have full details on our web pages before the show.

 

All the best

 

David

 

I'll have to have a good old touchy feel at the NEC.

Was gonna get myself a Haibike this year, but seeing the Grace MX has made me think twice.

Good to see the design of bikes going in the right direction

 

BTW, when is the show on?

Bike Europe last week carried the news that price increases of at least 10% were expected in China from the end of this year. Once the import duty from China is added, plus the possibility of an anti-dumping tax on e-bikes, the low transport costs and minimal import bureaucracy from within Europe, Germany starts to look a very attractive place to make e-bikes. Their high quality control standards and the customer appeal of German quality manufacture can be a real clincher.

 

But they still arent making them totally are they ?

 

I just wish that bikes could actually be made in Germany, or even better, the UK, instead of really being nothing more than an assembly place for Chinese parts in the main.

 

What parts exactly DO they manufacture in Germany and what parts normally still come from China ?

 

I can appreciate the possibility of better quality control standards but that still doesnt get away from the fact that a lot of the parts are still manufactured in China.......and obviously still have to be shipped.

And indeed, the Chinese/far east quality control seems to have improved enormously in the last few years.

 

I also appreciate the fact that setting up such an enterprise in Europe is massively expensive but surely the market in mainland Europe is now big enough to support that investment ?

 

There are, after all, already some small firms manufacturing their own bikes, Im just not sure if even they actually make ALL the parts needed ?

How difficult can it be to manufacture all the bike parts needed....it just seems such a shame that the major firms still don't......won't....or can't.....

 

Lynda

There are, after all, already some small firms manufacturing their own bikes, Im just not sure if even they actually make ALL the parts needed ?

How difficult can it be to manufacture all the bike parts needed....it just seems such a shame that the major firms still don't......won't....or can't.....

 

Lynda

 

It comes down to economics Lynda, there are no bike manufacturers that make every component (Flecc will correct me if I am wrong) brakes, wheels, spokes, chains, gears, saddles, tyres, mudguards, cables, etc., etc., are all manufactured by specialist companies and predominantly in the Far East.

 

In reality, there is no such thing as a British, German, American, Japanese bike.

 

There are many purely Chinese bikes, but you probably would not like or want one.

 

eZee is a brand manufactured in China has a Singaporean owner, parts are sourced from China, Japan, Taiwan, South Korea and elsewhere, with Canadian design input.

 

Incidentally, their Schwalbe German tyres are made in Indonesia in partnership with a Korean company.

I suppose so John, thats what comes from having so many components, when you start listing them I suppose it starts to make sense !

 

So how much can you really say about, for example , German engineering.....when its really German assembling ?

 

Although, Davids comments about his german partners spoke assembly machine sounds impressive .

 

Maybe for now, we, the general buying public, will just have to accept that bikes are a bit like the UN

 

Having had experience of cheap bad chinese bikes years ago I suppose we should feel lucky that some companies are experienced enough now to put various parts together to make decent bikes, regardless of where all the different parts come from.

 

Yourself ( or rather Ezee ) included of course

 

Lynda

 

(And my Tonaro is still made good enough for me ......lol )

 

 

 

Lynda

There's also the investment factor, it would cost a vast fortune to set up to compete with Shimano, nor would there be any guarantee of success, given Shimano's dominant place in the market.

 

On the China price increase I mentioned, it was said to be predominantly due to rising labour cost, i.e. wages. China is following the path of Japan post war. They took over supplying technology to the world market on the strength of low wages, but the increasing success meant labour shortages, demands for more money yet and resulting increasing affluence. Eventually they priced themselves out of competition, China and other oriental countries being cheaper. Now China is very gradually doing the same and losing markets, so the numbers of bikes and even motorbikes and cars being produced in Taiwan, Indonesia, India, Sri Lanka and other low cost countries is increasing substantially.

 

Those rising Chinese costs and their labour shortages are making fresh openings for European manufacture, especially as the high unemployment in Europe is starting to reduce labour costs.

I

Maybe for now, we, the general buying public, will just have to accept that bikes are a bit like the UN

Lynda

 

Hi Lynda

 

I don't think a bike built by the UN would very good in practice and I certainly can't see a blue helmet being to your taste;)

Hi Lynda

 

I don't think a bike built by the UN would very good in practice and I certainly can't see a blue helmet being to your taste;)

 

LOL....oh I dont know.....could be good if cycling in a war zone

 

And stop trying to start a helmet war again.....you know I never wear one

 

Lynda

Hi David,well you could have predicted that Kudos has taken the contrarian view, we have 5 new bikes currently in build in China,which have an amazing specification for the quality and price. I must say looking around at the Eurobike show that 2500 euro bikes from the big German suppliers are nothing more than badge engineered Chinese product,excepting the Bosch drive system the parts list is straight out of the Chinese parts bin-nexus,spanning a,shimano etc are all Chinese derived parts.

I just cannot see the point of shipping that lot across the world for some German to earn 20 euros per hour screwing it all together. It's all about control,we now have 50 plus Chinese suppliers who understand that quality comes before price,the Chinese bike assembler is like the Chinese restaurant they will prepare a bike or a meal dependent upon what you want to pay,Chinese labour cost rises are currently insignificant,

Dave

Kudoscycles

I broke off the thread because the wifi system here in Ravensburg is not that good.

This Bosch monopoly is what is holding up the e-bike price structure and the new AEG system will not disrupt the price maintenance. The Chinese have tried to copy the Bosch system without success,Suzhou Bafang had an e-bike with Bafang centre drive which was still not right. We have taken the view that the only problem with the hub drive system is slow speed power up hills,in all other situations the hub drive works well,if anything more efficient than a crank drive,we have a new system in 3 of our new bikes that overcomes most of the criticism of the hub drive on a well specified e-bike costing less than £1000.

2013 will be a very interesting year for the UK e-bike industry.

Dave

Kudoscycles

From my understanding of the subject, the increased cost of energy and raw materials of all kinds is a major contributory factor to increasing manufacturing costs. This in turn leads to demands for higher wages so that people can maintain or improve living standards.

These people do a crankdrive kit if anyone fancies a crack at a conversion:

 

Aliexpress.com : Buy electric bicycle BLDC central motor/engine(Differentfrom Panasonic and Bosch) from Reliable crank motor suppliers on MW motor

Their are about 10 Asian crank drive systems in various stages of development,many on sample e-bikes at the Eurobike show,they are all close but not right ,I suspect that Bosch went through a big r&d program to sort out the details but one of the Chinese will get it right in the end and a crank drive unit will cost 100usd.

For an aftermarket fitment the new AEG system is so easy to fit,needing no adaptions to the bike frame but at euros 550!!

Dave

Kudoscycles

One factor nobody has mentioned is shipping costs,it costs £15.00 to ship a bike from China but the cheapest I can bulk ship bikes to Germany across the channel is £50.00 per bike. That's not a problem if building bikes to be sold in Germany but it is a problem for bikes being shipped back to the UK.

Dave

Kudoscycles

One factor nobody has mentioned is shipping costs,it costs £15.00 to ship a bike from China but the cheapest I can bulk ship bikes to Germany across the channel is £50.00 per bike. That's not a problem if building bikes to be sold in Germany but it is a problem for bikes being shipped back to the UK.

Dave

Kudoscycles

 

Dave,

I agree with you on the pricing you have quoted, but shipping costs are only part of the overall cost. Warehousing is substantially lower in Germany than in the UK, and Germany being the centre pretty much of EU trade it would make sense to base the operation there. Furthermore shipping from Germany to the UK is cheaper than the other way round.

On a slightly different note, I am not sure about the 'Made in Germany' label. I thought you needed more than 17% of German made components in order to claim that label, and the reduced range of 3 bikes would still be essentially the same as before. Comments anyone?

Lastly, you have also talked about Chinese crank drives making their debut at the Eurobike show. Can we expect to see any of them in the Kudos range soon? We have been looking at Bofeili bikes recently but cannot understand the fascination for crank drive (unless you have very weak legs and very steep hills....)?

Hatti,

I never ship from Germany to the UK so was not aware that shipping costs in that direction are cheaper,but the bikes still have to come across the Chanel and that seems the expensive link.

We are currently testing 2 crank drive bikes,1 appears at this stage to be very good.

But we have a new system fitted to our latest hub drive bikes which absolutely transforms the low speed hill climbing ability,it may make crank drive only attractive if living in a very hilly area,the new system is ideal for riders who spend most of their riding on the flat or slight hill but occasionally have a steepie to climb,which is quite a common requirement.

For obvious reasons I do not wish to go into further details excepting to say that despite the higher specification and technology we will still maintain about £1000 price point,Kudos cycles is determined to make e-biking affordable to all.

Dave

Kudoscycles

Ps. About to jump on a plane back to the UK

One factor nobody has mentioned is shipping costs,it costs £15.00 to ship a bike from China but the cheapest I can bulk ship bikes to Germany across the channel is £50.00 per bike. That's not a problem if building bikes to be sold in Germany but it is a problem for bikes being shipped back to the UK.

Dave

Kudoscycles

 

Wow, £10,000 for a bulk delivery seems a bit excessive Dave?

 

I assume by bulk you mean a 40' container?

 

All the best

 

David

Edited September 1, 201213 yr by Wisper Bikes

There is nothing wrong with assembling bikes in China, we have been doing this for nearly eight years.

 

However......

 

As Flecc has correctly pointed out, due to a number of factors including rising wages, the reducing differential between assembly costs in China and Europe have made the reasons for not having production closer to home far less compelling. With more increases in the pipeline and the specter of the 48.5% ADDITIONAL dumping tax on the horizon, moving to Europe seemed to me to be a sensible move, providing a stable base for the future. I agree such a move would not be easy in a lot of respects for those companies that simply rebadge Chinese models. Having new models and developments in the pipeline we at Wisper need to pay close and constant attention to detail. Having spent many hundreds of hours flying back and forth between UK and Shanghai over the last eight years, I find the prospect of being able to "pop" over to the factory and back home in a day most appealing. This means that instead of quarterly production and development meetings in Shanghai, I can now visit the factory on a weekly basis if necessary. (My wife is not happy though, she loved all those airmiles!)

 

We intend to take full advantage of the massive market for our bikes just over the channel. In Germany especially, the "Made in Germany" badge is massively important. However people in Germany understand that a lot of components used to build "Made in Germany" bikes (and cars!) come from Asia, but importantly assembly and quality control is to European standards. The Germans feel more comfortable with the ultimate responsibility for production being close to home, it is a shame we in Britain don't feel the same. If we did maybe we would start to see factories opening again?

 

Components for our bikes come from all over Asia and will continue to do so, but now some of those components will be made in Europe. Companies such as Shimano have factories all over the world they simply follow the cheapest production possibilities. Who can blame them as long as they have control of quality?

 

I am very comfortable with the move, I think it will help us to continue to expand and improve.

 

All the best

 

David