The two-wheelers will be made in France and should go on sale in just under a year.
By Le Figaro with AFP
Published update
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The Mini car manufacturer will launch a range of electric bicycles designed by the connected bicycle brand Angell and produced in France by Seb, the French company announced to AFP on Thursday. Angell won a tender to develop, manufacture and distribute a range of bicycles for five years in collaboration with the Mini teams.
The British brand, revived in 2000 by the BMW group, is to launch two new models of electric cars in 2023 and plans to be 100% electric in 2030. The first bikes will be designed on the basis of the Angells, and manufactured like them in the Seb factory in Is-sur-Tille, north of Dijon (Côte d’Or). They should be available from winter 2023/2024, and distributed on “several networks“Said the two brands.
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When Angell launched in 2019, “we hit the car quite hard, individual and thermal“, underlined its founder, the French entrepreneur Marc Simoncini, which previously launched the dating site Meetic. “But from the moment the car becomes electric and less individual, we say to ourselves that the fight is won. And the Mini is very urban, that’s our core target and our expertise.“, continued Marc Simoncini. The high-end brand also intends to grow by launching a new product every six months, starting with a helmet, then new bikes.
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“The myth of the universal bicycle will suffer”
With an electric bike market that has exploded since 2020, “the myth of the universal bike will suffer, practices will become more mature“, explained John Mollanger, the director of Angell. Like its competitors Cowboy and Vanmoof, it started with a first and only rather urban and light bike which sold 5,000 copies between its launch in 2020 and the launch in early 2022 of a second, more comfortable model.
For their part, industry histories like Cannondale or Specialized cover all sub-categories of the bike. “There’s a gap so big we can do something different“, while remaining in the category of urban bikes, wants to believe Mr. Mollanger. The brand will also expand its distribution network, initially designed to be 100% direct: it will soon be distributed in around fifty stores in Europe, in particular so that customers can test the bikes. Ultimately, Angell hopes to double its sales in 2023.
The price of the future Mini range has not been specified but the Angell bikes are offered at around 3000 euros. Angell does not rule out the idea of a folding bike, which would fit in the trunk of a Mini.
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