Skip to main content

GM is getting into ebikes, and it wants you to help name them

As part of efforts to broaden its business and fulfill its commitment to an all-electric future, General Motors has announced plans to enter the ebike market.

The American car giant is developing not one but two pedal-assist electric bikes — one compact model and one that folds up.

At this stage, it’s not offering any specs for the machines, opting instead to release a few photos of each of the bikes. Certainly, the casual designs seem geared toward city dwellers looking to speed up short journeys, while the foldable machine in particular could appeal to commuters looking for an easy way to zip between public transit and their home or workplace.

“As an avid cyclist and urban commuter, I know how great it feels to get where I’m going easily and to show up sweat-free,” Hannah Parish, director of General Motors Urban Mobility Solutions, said in a release. “We blended electrification engineering know-how, design talents, and automotive-grade testing with great minds from the bike industry to create our eBikes.”

$10,000 contest to name the bikes

Parish added that GM is keen to expand its thinking “beyond the company walls and hear from people who like to move and have rad ideas.”

She’s talking about finding a name for GM’s ebike brand, though ever since the internet voted to name a polar research vessel Boaty McBoatface a few years back, asking members of the public for naming suggestions clearly carries some risk.

So, once GM has spent what could be several days filtering out all of the daft suggestions (think Bikey McBikeface, Wheely McWheelface, or perhaps Spokey McSpokeface), the company should be left with at least a handful of more sensible entries that it can choose from.

Tips for those keen to enter the contest include coming up with “simple, smart, and bold concepts capable of bringing the ebike brand to life,” as well as something that’s “capable of being understood around the world.”

Detroit-based GM is offering a $10,000 cash prize to the person who comes up with the winning name for GM’s new ebike brand, while nine other entrants offering excellent-but-not-quite-good-enough suggestions will each receive $1,000, which, looking at the cost of some of the best ebikes on the market today, is unlikely to be enough to purchase so much as the saddle on one of GM’s new bikes when they launch next year.

You have until November 26 to dazzle GM with your ideas.

Editors' Recommendations

Trevor Mogg
Contributing Editor
Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…
It’s the end of the road for GM carsharing service Maven
maven car sharing

General Motors (GM) is shuttering its Maven carsharing service four years after it launched.

Signs that the app-based service was in trouble came almost a year ago when Maven pulled out of eight of the 17 North American cities where it operated, including New York, Boston, and Chicago. It remained operational in cities such as Los Angeles, Detroit, and Toronto, and Washington, D.C., but now the entire service will be closed down.

Read more
GM’s modular Ultium platform will be building block of its future electric cars
GM Ultium EV platform

With the Chevrolet Bolt EV, General Motors proved that it could make a good electric car. But GM has failed to capitalize on the Bolt EV -- until now.

GM just revealed Ultium, a package of mechanical components that will form the basis for a slew of upcoming electric cars. Ultium includes a basic vehicle platform, powertrain, and batteries, all designed to be modular in order to fit a wide variety of applications.

Read more
GM gets serious with $2.2 billion investment in electric trucks, SUVs
General Motors dedicated electric car factory

After years of talk, General Motors is finally getting serious about building large numbers of electric cars. The largest United States automaker will spend $2.2 billion to retool its Detroit-Hamtramck factory for electric-car production. This will be the first GM factory dedicated to electric cars, with cars scheduled to start rolling off its assembly line in 2021.

GM currently has just one all-electric model in its U.S. lineup -- the Chevrolet Bolt EV. That car is built in a factory that also makes gasoline models. GM has said it plans to launch 20 all-electric models globally 2023. While not all of those cars will be sold in the U.S., the plan still requires GM to massively expand manufacturing infrastructure. The investment in the Detroit-Hamtramck plant is the first indication that GM is actually following through with that plan.

Read more