History @ RideWERX

History

Bionicon's History & Philosophy

PHILOSOPHY

Those who have been closely following our background might have held a Bionicon catalogue in their hands. What has changed and how have we changed? The evolution can be seen in our daily work and development. We have intensively asked ourselves why one should buy a Bionicon.

Who are we? To try and express this we are using more pictures this year. Images of the people and the landscapes that surround the birthplace of Bionicon - Tegernsee. Meanwhile Bionicon isn’t just in one spot but extends right around the globe. We see ourselves and our products in interdependence with our environment and you, the people who surround and trust us all over the world.

Everyone who is inspired by Bionicon is also interested in an all embracing, honest and tolerant view to life and it is exactly this approach which we try to reflect in our products. The products which we develop form a system in which the sum of the individual components and innovations is greater than that of the parts themselves. Put simply the best rear derailleur in the world achieves nothing if bolted to a poorly conceived whole concept.

You can see the passion for mountainbiking in all our products. They are created by people who love biking, be it the feeling of gliding over leaf covered trails, conquering mountain peaks or just soaking up nature. Ours is a sport of feelings and shared triumphs with friends, yet it is also a sport where equipment plays a crucial role. Experience shows that riders are shaped by the environment in which they spend the most time. We have designed our product line in order to do justice to the huge variety of nature, people and riding styles. Everyone can find the ideal bike in our range. We describe the choice of bike by the rider as the basic needs and expand these with our unique Bionicon geometry adjustment system. This radically increases the range of use for all of our full suspension bikes and makes our product superior to anything else on the market.

“We ride what we are and we sell what we ride”

Can you define yourself through a product? We can! BIONICON is a product not a theory; one which came into being during our backcountry rides in the Tegrensee Alps during the 90’s. At the time a bike with 130mm of travel was “radical” and our backcountry rides were “crazy”. But our vision was clear: we wanted a bike like a mountain goat, so that you always had the right bike, wherever you were seeking adventure in the great outdoors - this is how BIONICON was born.

Much has changed in the past years. Our product range has become wider and alongside mountainbikes now includes hardware for urban mobility. In Tegernsee, across Europe, Asia and the USA you will find people working for BIONICON and more and more riders who are thrilled by our brand and products. One thing is and will stay the same: the circle of people around BIONICON is all important. They belong to our RIDERS INNOVATION CIRCLE, which has the aim of creating products which offer honest solutions. For our beautiful sport and for everyone, no matter how they ride.

RIDE WITH US

HISTORY

In 1996 we bought our first full suspension bike and only half a year later we started to think seriously about how to optimize our daily ride, as we were not satisfied with the uphill performance. The rising front wheel on uphill sections and a hurting neck drove us insane. Lots of brainstorming, doubts over existing products and inspiration from nature showed us the path towards suspension travel and geometry adjustment as a way to optimize the daily ride, apart from simply reducing weight.

Step by step theories were developed, we created our first basic model in 1998 and many versions followed. In 1999 we shifted our development to the pneumatic link system you can see on this website.

It was more logical to adjust the front and the rear of the chassis simultaneously as animals do. More than twenty different versions were created in our little work shop in Bavaria.

On May 1st 2000 we presented this technology for the first time to the world of mountain biking at the Garda lake bike festival. This was the point of no return and we found ourselves the centre of attention with envious onlookers from within the bike industry. Winning the ISPO DuPont Brand New Award 2000 for the most innovative sports product gave us tons of PR and drove us to bring this system into the market.

In April 2002 this pioneering product was finally available for everybody.

Bionicon's headquarters in located in Rottach-Weissach in Bavaria, Germany. This is also the location of the design and development centre. We are proud in our association with RideWERX as our Australian distributor.