The 2008 Taipei International Cycle Show just wrapped up in Taiwan. According to a press release, attendance was up 91 percent from 2007 with 86,000 visitors compared to 45,000 last year. I haven’t yet been able to see everything from the show, but I did download and take a glance at the show daily pdf files that are available on the website. In addition, David Reid has a great set of show pictures on Flickr that I enjoyed looking through. Tim Jackson, aka Masiguy, was also at the show, so I look forward to seeing his pictures soon when he gets a chance to post them.

Of course the results of the 12th International Bicycle Design Competition were the main thing that I wanted to see. There is no doubt that this competition always produces some rather strange designs, but I always enjoy checking them out. Even if I don’t always like the forms, I think some interesting ideas are usually presented. This year there were two winners chosen, one by Giant and one by Merida. The Giant prize went to Larry Chen for the Sunny Day solar electric bike (pictured above). Merida picked Combike (below) designed by Li-Ru Lai and Fen-Ju Lin. The Combike design allows two of the same bicycles to be ridden separately or joined to create a tandem. You can see all of this year’s entries by downloading the March 13th Show Daily or by clicking the Special Issue on the 2008 IBDC event link at the competition website.

Many of you know that Taiwanese bike maker Merida is part owner of Specialized Bikes. Since Merida was involved in the International Bicycle Design Competition, Specialized Founder Mike Sinyard was on hand to speak at the International Bicycle Trend Forum. It sounds like his talk was directly related to design, so I am very curious what he had to say. If any of you attended the forum and heard what Mr. Sinyard said, please let me know.