If you’re in the UK and like the sound of Upway’s marketplace for refurbished e-bikes, unfortunately you’re looking at a bit of wait. While business is booming and there are plans for expansion into any number of new markets, it doesn’t seem likely that the UK will be one of them.

We first reported on Upway in 2021 when the firm raised €5m to set up a second-hand marketplace devoted to e-bikes.

The idea was to provide the reassurance of electric bikes reconditioned to industry standards with a one-year warranty while being able to sell them 35-45 per cent cheaper than new.  

This proved a sufficiently appealing recipe that a year later, the firm was able to raise another €23m.

As well as France, it now also operates in Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain, Austria and Switzerland.

“Next on the list in terms of expansion is Canada, Japan, Australia, Portugal, Italy and potentially the UK,” US manager Maxime Renson told Zag Daily recently.

Upway US accounts for about 20 per cent of Upway’s business, but Germany is currently its biggest market.

According to Renson: “I think around two million [e-bikes] were sold last year, while 700k e-bikes were sold in France and one million in the US. This is down to the tax incentives that Germany has in place which makes buying an e-bike much cheaper.”

This means that the German used e-bike market is twice the size of that for new bikes. In contrast, the UK second-hand market is limited for the simple reason that there aren’t yet that many e-bikes out there.

“The selection of used e-bikes is really broad in Germany which is what attracted us to the market,” said Renson. “In the UK, that volume does not exist yet which makes setting up a well-stocked marketplace more difficult.”

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