BikeBiz Bicycle and cycling retail news
Northern Ireland based, multi-award winning, cycling technology company, See.Sense, owned by husband and wife team Philip and Irene McAleese, is getting ready to launch a crowdfunding campaign with investment platform Crowdcube.
Cyclists and the general public will have the opportunity to buy shares in See.Sense via Crowdcube in return for equity as well as receiving ‘money can’t buy rewards’ that are exclusive only to investors.
See.Sense’s bicycle light ICON, designed and manufactured in Northern Ireland, is stocked with major retailers such as Chain Reaction Cycles and sold into more than 50 countries around the world. The company has nearly doubled its revenues year on year and has been nominated by the cycle industry as a ‘Breakthrough Brand of the Year,’ voted winner of the People’s Choice ‘rear light of the year’ in Road.cc. The product was featured in the London Design Museum’s ‘Cycle Revolution Exhibition.’
The company has also built up a strong community of cyclists, following two successful Kickstarter campaigns, where they raised over £114K from over 1400 backers. The company just announced a new distribution deal with leading distributor Raleigh, covering UK and ROI, as well as recently winning the BT Infinity Lab SME Award for Connected Cities, held in conjunction with the UK Cabinet office.
ICON uses advanced sensor and connectivity technology to react to higher risk situations and improve cyclist’s visibility, as well as using smartphone integration to provide theft and crash detection alerts. It also collects data that the company can convert into business intelligence, enabling cities to solve some of their biggest infrastructure and resource challenges.Through the Crowdcube campaign, the company is seeking to raise £500,000 against a pre-money valuation of £2,000,000.
See.Sense CEO, Philip McAleese commented: "We have some hugely innovative new products in the pipeline, and we’ve some amazing opportunities opening up with cities who are interested in our crowdsourced data. To give fuel to the fire, we’re inviting our community – the people who use and love our products – to help us grow.
"To demonstrate the potential of our crowdsourced data, we have begun work with the city of Milton Keynes on a full-scale trial. We are very excited about these opportunities and we hope that this will entice would be investors to, not only take See Sense to its next stage of growth, but to join us and be part of that journey.”
Supporting See.Sense ICON’s crowd-sourced data, Geoff Snelson, Strategy Director of Milton Keynes Council said: "I see a lot of tech ideas but what has really impressed me about See.Sense is that they have thought through the customer experience and value to the cyclist. Together with that they have the potential to collect valuable data that can contribute to mobility projects in Milton Keynes as we progress to become one of the world’s leading smart cities. We’re very excited to work with See.Sense on this trial for Milton Keynes.’
