Felt Bicycles has been sold by the French Rossignol Group to Austrian motorcycle conglomerate PIERER Mobility. The terms of the sale were not disclosed. Felt will become part of PIERER E-Bikes North America, Inc., which sits under PIERER eBikes GMBH. This is a division of PIERER Mobility, which will sell $2 billion Euros worth of 2-wheeled product this year and may be the fastest growing motorcycle maker in the world.
Felt has been a darling of triathlon since its inception in 1991. The brand was founded by ex-Easton man Jim Felt, who in 1999 brought on as partners ex-GT Bikes-man Bill Duehring and German bike distributor Michael Muellmann. Bikes made by the Felt brand were ridden by top women in triathlon, notably Paula Newby Fraser, Michellie Jones, Mirinda Carfrae and Daniela Ryf. The brand also has a strong history in bike racing with numerous grand tour appearances (and stage wins), and is currently ridden by American team Rally Cycling.
The three partners sold the Felt company to French winter sport company Rossignol at the beginning of 2017. (This interview with Felt and Duehring reveals their thoughts at the time.) After almost 5 years the brand moves further east, to an industrialist with a passion for racing.
PIERER Mobility is the parent company of KTM motorcycles, Husqvarna motorcycles, and the highly regarded (in the motorcycle world) WP Suspension. The CEO is Stefan Pierer (pictured above), a self-made industrialist who acquired a distressed KTM circa 1990. The brands he built – KTM and Husqvarna (acquired in 2013) – are heavy involved in racing and performance. Stefan Pierer is among other things a turnaround artist, buying KTM and Husqvarna motorcycles at a low point and turning each into strong successes. PIERER Mobility dominates the off-road motorcycle market in Europe, nevertheless most of its motorcycle business is on-road. Also, while the company is the largest motorcycle seller in Europe, most of its sales are outside of Europe. Its share of the motorcycle business in the U.S. more than tripled over the past decade.
Why did PIERER Mobility buy Felt Bicycles? It was reported in Bicycle Retailer & Industry News last February that the company intends to expand its sales of E-bikes into North America via the IBD sales channel (your independently-owned LBS). Felt Bicycles has a strong presence among IBDs, and this network could be leveraged to Felt’s advantage along with the other E-bike brands PIERER Mobility owns (Husqvarna’s E-bike is a strong seller in Europe, along with Spanish brand GASGAS, also owned by PIERER Mobility).
But this doesn’t mean purely-leg-powered bikes are not of interest to the new owner. From interviews with those involved in the acquisition Felt’s Tour de France and Kona victories meshed with race-performance-oriented PIERER Mobility, which is heavily into
carbon fiber tech and aerodynamics, illustrated by KTM’s big move into (and success in) the MotoGP space over the past half-decade. Also, PIERER Mobility invested in Maxcom, a large bicycle manufacturing plant in Bulgaria with a production of 350,000 units per year. All this could accrue to Felt’s benefit, both in manufacturing and to speed up product development cycles.
Why did the Rossignol Group sell Felt Bicycles? Prior to that company’s acquisition of Felt in 2017, a strength and weakness of the brand was its breadth. A small-to-mid-sized company, Felt made a full range of MTB, road and tri bikes, along with cruisers and lifestyle bikes. This product breadth made it a brand darling to IBDs, but the stress on the company to develop, manufacture, inventory and warehouse parts and bikes was immense. Scott Rittschoff (ex Cannondale, Cervelo, Focus) was brought in to manage the brand, and streamlined the offerings to its core: road and tri.
While Felt was doing its brand refocus, Rossignol was in the midst of the same. Rossignol seeks to be a 12-month resort brand, and it has that now with winter (Rossignol, Lange, Dynastar, Look), along with its summer brand of resort MTB. Rossignol’s focus is on its own brand, which includes off-road bikes, aided by Felt’s design and engineering during the Rossi tenure.
To avoid confusion, the KTM brand included both bicycles and motorcycles in the 1980s. When Stefan Pierer assumed ownership of the motorcycle division, the bicycle division went to another owner. The KTM bicycle brand is a separate company and not owned by PIERER Mobility. Husqvarna, the Swedish company, sold its motorcycle division and that is part of the PIERER Mobility group, but it maintains ownership of the rest of Husqvarna, including the manufacture of chainsaws and garden products (it also owns McCulloch, Poulan, Weed Eater).
While PIERER Mobility has assumed Felt’s lease on its Irvine, CA, building, KTM Group North America just broke ground on a $58 million dollar headquarter campus in Murrietta, CA, just over an hour away. That campus will be complete in a year.
(PHOTOS: Courtesy of KTM Sportmotorcycle; and Rob Gray's MotoGP image of Danilo Petrucci)
