Significant development of Portugal’s 2-wheel and soft mobility sector 2023: a time for new challenges

The Portuguese 2-wheel and soft mobility sector is in full development, with everything indicating that last year was the bestperforming year yet as the sector continues to grow, and grow well. But with the new year, new challenges come, which will certainly consolidate Portugal as an international case study for the sector and beyond.

The figures for the 2-wheel and soft mobility sector in 2022 could hardly be better.

Up until December, the sector registered a growth of 37%. We are still waiting for the official figures to confirm that more than 3 million units were exported and the ‘barrier’ of €800 million in exports was also broken.

A commitment to quality

The search for new markets and, above all, the increased commitment to competitive markets, such as those in central and northern Europe, allowed the sector to reinforce its commitment to quality and higher-value products.

Portuguese entrepreneurs in the 2-wheel and soft mobility sector are betting on quality but are also increasing the production of components, making Portugal and Europe less dependent on external markets.

Economies of scale and greater efficiency

But 2022 was also the year ABIMOTA made available to the hardware and metal furniture sector (sectors also represented by this association) all the knowledge accumulated during the development, promotion and internationalisation of 2-wheels and soft mobility.

The joint projects ABIMOTA Fest 2020 and ABIMOTA Export 2020, co-financed by Compete 2020 and Portugal 2020, respectively, bring together the Portugal Bike Value and PortugalBuildingHardware brands, thus creating economies of scale and greater efficiency throughout the entire process.

Innovation and development

The year 2022 was also the year in which Bikinnov – Bike Value Inovation Center – Association was founded. This society will manage the Technological Interface Center (TIC) specifically designed for the 2-wheel and soft mobility sector. It intends to offer companies an appropriate environment to innovate and develop their products.

The TIC intends to assert itself as a multifunctional project aimed at responding to the sector’s different requirements and to be on par with the best players in the bicycle sector worldwide in terms of research and development, internally combining and developing the capacities that already exist in Portugal.

The sector continues to develop

The bet for 2023 is to produce bicycles and components of the best quality, encouraging the development of existing companies and the creation of new, modern and technologically developed companies, as well as laboratories that allow the creation, development and testing of the best solutions and technologies.

These actions all project the future of both sectors. The repositioning of brands and products under the aegis of both common brands, PortugalBuildingHardware and, of course, Portugal Bike Value, the replacement for quality and the search for new markets are the reality for 2023, with strong bets happening in extra-European countries.