Meet The Bicycle With An Exclusive License From MIT

If Copenhagen were a person, that person would be generous, beautiful, elderly, but with a certain flair about them. A human being that has certain propensities for quarrelling, filled with imagination and with appetite for the new and with respect for the old — somebody who takes good care of things and of people.

But if Copenhagen were a bicycle, it would be a smart electric hybrid that is the quickest and easiest-to-use bicycle you have ever seen.

However, The Copenhagen Wheel doesn’t come from the city of spires, but from Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. In late 2012, Assaf Biderman, Associate Director at MIT’s Senseable City Lab founded Superdestrian with the passion for developing lightweight electric vehicles with integrated online platforms, finding new ways to connect people with their environment. The Copenhagen Wheel is their first human-powered mobility vehicle for cities.

“With The Copenhagen Wheel, Superdestrian is solving complex problems with remarkable simplicity. The group has introduced a powerful design that has the potential to transform the way we move around,” said General Catalyst Managing Director David Fialkow.

The bike has plenty of innovative features that will offer you alternative cyclings. It contains a motor, batteries, multiple sensors, wireless connectivity, and an embedded control system. A bike that never stops learning how you pedal and integrates seamlessly with your motion, multiplying your pedal power 3x-10x. It makes hills feel flat and distances shrink, so you can cycle just about anywhere.

As your phone is getting smarter, your bike is getting smarter too. All actuation of the wheel happens automatically via the pedals through sensing and control algorithms. When the rider pedals harder, such as when going uphill, the wheel pushes with increasing power. Using your smartphone with the Superdestrian app, you can vary the level of powered assist, lock/unlock your wheel, customizable rides, and track personal usage statistics such as time, distance, calories burned, elevation climbed and more. The bike is also able to capture energy when braking or going downhill that it stores in the integrated lithium battery pack. Nothing is wasted!

It’s all started with this question: “How do we get more people to cycle?”

You may also be interested in check out other news for cyclists here.

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