UK-based biking firm tracks success
INSYNC BIKES has been ranked seventh among the fastest-growing Indianowned companies in the UK after registering a 43 per cent growth last year.
The Manchester-headquartered company, owned by India’s Hero Cycles, the world’s largest pedal bike manufacturer, received a Tracker Award in London, having appeared in Grant Thornton’s annual India meets Britain tracker report.
British investment minister Lord Gerry Grimstone presented the award to Insync’s head of business Gopal Krishan.
The Tracker report, brought out in collaboration with the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), tracks Indian-owned companies with a turnover of more than £5 million and year-on-year revenue growth of at least 10 per cent and a minimum two-year track record in the UK. Some 37 companies, including Insync, met the criteria.
Insync sold more than 50,000 bikes in the year to November 2020, a 200 per cent increase over the previous year. It sold a further 186,000 bikes in 2021, Insync’s executive director, Raman Awasthi, revealed.
He said sales were driven by a surge in the demand for bikes as a healthier form of commuting and exercise.
The lockdown in 2020 saw cycling increase by 300 per cent, according to Cycling Industry News. Interest was also encouraged by prime minister Boris Johnson’s investment of £2 billion in a cycling and walking strategy.
Raman said women’s hybrid and mountain bikes and children’s bikes in the affordable range of £350-£500 saw “unprecedented levels” of demand in 2020-21.
He added that Hero Cycles was committed to investments in the UK and in helping establish a mutually beneficial relationship between the UK and India.
“Insync Bikes now has around 10 per cent of the UK bike market. We plan to double that to around 20 per cent in the next two years, with a focus on a premium range of bikes and a new range of ebikes, launched as part of our new partnership with the German e-bike manufacturer HNF GmbH. It is also a Hero International company and will bring German precision research and development to the UK,” he said.
In April, Insync announced plans to add a new ecycle assembly line within its manufacturing facility in Manchester. Expected to be operational by August, it forms part of a £150m group-wide investment and will produce 50,000 bikes over three years and scale up to 30,000 bikes annually.