You are a passionate biker yourself. What is your favourite bike to get out of the garage?
That's a question I ask myself every weekend. I have all types of bikes in my cellar and it's really difficult for me to decide whether to go for a road bike, mountain bike or e-mountain bike. But I'm getting on an e-MTB more and more often because I enjoy it so much. Especially if you live in the low mountain range like I do, you simply get more metres of altitude in your legs.
And of course, I don't have enough time: lots of work, lots of travelling, little free time, wife, family. It's the same for a lot of people in their mid-30s - there's no time to train, but you still want to ride like you did fifteen years ago. And you can do that with an e-mountainbike because your riding technique hardly deteriorates. Then you can ride longer and more often because your heart rate doesn't immediately hit 180.
What came first in your life, the bike or the Bosch company?
The bike. I bought my first mountain bike while I was still at university in 1990. A red Diamond Back Apex with Shimano Deore DX. As a passionate biker, I used it to explore the Alps. Racing bikes followed later. I started at Bosch in 1995, when I rode my first downhill race in Bühlertal.
downhill race in Bühlertal. Marcus Klausmann won and I finished somewhere in the middle of the field in the hobby class. But back then I had nothing to do with bikes professionally. I only came into contact with Bosch eBike Systems when I started working as an assistant to the board of management at Bosch in 2010. Two years
I was allowed to take over the division two years later.
Passionate biker, even downhill racer - didn't you have an image problem with e-bikes?
Well, my first contact was at my bike dealer in Baden-Baden. He gave me an e-bike and said: "Here, ride it." I replied: "Nah, don't bother, that's embarrassing." But then I tried it and actually thought it was cool. That was in 2008, and a little later we started thinking about it among our friends and thought that the e-drive would also be great for mountain bikes.
How can we imagine a mega-corporation like Bosch entering the bicycle industry?
It is quite something for a company that comes from traditional industries to enter such a lifestyle market. Bosch generates 60 per cent of its sales in the automotive sector, the other parts are household appliances and power tools, and until then it had nothing to do with bicycles. Bosch
eBike Systems was founded in 2009 as an internal start-up. The idea: We take the motors from the automotive industry, the battery technology from power tools, combine this with our expertise in the areas of sensor technology and electronics and develop a system for bicycles. That requires trust. We became the market leader in 2012.
So the plan worked out. When did you realise that sporty mountain bikes could also be a success?
We already described this in our development strategy in 2011. The e-bike will also establish itself in the sporty segment via sporty products, initially via trekking bikes and later also in the MTB segment. We introduced the Bosch Active and Performance Line in 2013 to clearly delineate the segments. Originally, we assumed that the target group of over 60-year-olds could be rejuvenated to over 40-year-olds. Today, we have reached 30 plus. That happened surprisingly quickly.
But there are still many people who reject e-drives on bikes.
Five years ago, it was embarrassing to be seen anywhere near an electric bike when you were under 50. Today, it's a lifestyle - both in the city and for sport. And if you put the kids on an e-bike, they have no reservations, they think it's cool. Only the purists between 20 and 35 reject it. You have to ride an e-mountainbike, you can't explain it.
Competitors' systems allow bike manufacturers to exert more influence. Bosch tends to be more tight-lipped.
We ensure that the motor, battery, charger, display and diagnostics function smoothly. And we make sure that the batteries are interchangeable between different models. Today it is no problem to borrow another Bosch battery for longer tours. We don't think much of niche solutions. But of course we know that we still have room for improvement in terms of installation space for kinematics and bottle cages, etc. Our development goals are very clear: smaller, lighter, more efficient. The bike manufacturers want to regain control of the frame design - and that's the way it has to be. The developments for this are underway.
