Magna Marque, a subsidiary of Canadian autoparts giant Magna International, has announced a four-week bikeshare trial in California that will sees its BionX electric bikes used on the Sacremento campus of the California Energy Environmental Protection Agency. The project is in partnership with Ecotron Systems, which is making the bikeshare stations. I’m a big fan of BionX, which I had the chance to test out for a month in 2008. The BionX system is not a bike, but an e-bike retrofit kit that includes a battery, electric motor and handlebar control panel, all tied together with sophisticated energy-management software. You can put the system on your existing bike or purchase a new bike complete with the system (Trek and Diamant are among the big-name devotees). I wrote about the company back in August 2008 and it continues to forge ahead, preferring to downplay the Magna connection and focus instead of building the BionX brand. At the time, they told me they were working on a bikeshare model for e-bikes, so apparently they’re ready to start showing it off. This pilot in California will be, I’m sure, the first of many to come.

Funny, when I first met Magna Marque CEO Fred Gingl, he told me one of the bikes was sent to California Governor Arnold Schwartzenegger, a fellow Austrian along with Magna International founder Frank Stronach. Guess Arnie liked them. It will be interesting to see how electric bikes, a much more delicate and expensive product than a typical barebones bike, will be introduced to the bikeshare model. I expect campus environments will be the first market, as these bikes go through tremendous abuse in citywide bikeshare programs.

Nearly two years ago Magna Marque, a subsidiary of Magna International, quietly acquired a small company in Quebec called EPS Energy Propulsion Systems Inc., maker of the BionX e-bike kit. Manfred Gingl, founder and president of Magna Marque and former CEO of parent company Magna International, had a personal interest in bicycle technology and realized the market for e-bikes would be huge. Today, I have a story in the Toronto Star (sidebar here) that for the first time gives readers an inside look at what Magna is up to and how it plans to be a leading supplier of electric propulsion systems for bicycles and other mobile products, from paddle boats to three-wheeled urban vehicles. The company, quite simply, wants to be the Shimano of e-bikes. It already has supply agreements with Trek and is in serious talks with other bicycle manufacturers.

Aurora, Ont.-based Magna, of course, isn’t doing very well with its traditional business. It saw sales plummet 45 per cent in its most recent quarter, reported yesterday, and swung to a $205 million loss. The company, however, is gradually positioning itself as a leading supplier of drive trains and other components for the emerging electric car market, and has a partnership with Ford and other players to follow through with that vision. But Gingl’s view is that the e-bike opportunity will come faster than the electric car market, and the two nicely complement each other. Magna Marque can leverage battery and motor development taking place for the electric-car side of Magna’s business, giving it an edge over other competitors in the e-bike market.

The BionX system itself is, in my own view, quite impressive. I currently have a demo bike at home and enjoy the ride immensely. (more…)