The basic problem is that their bikes are not good value for money. They look cool, but they are very basic bikes (despite various bells and whistles) and they

The basic problem is that their bikes are not good value for money. They look cool, but they are very basic bikes (despite various bells and whistles) and they have lots of custom parts. I think the VanMoof bikes looked really nice and had an interesting design. But unless you live in Amsterdam, they were not a good choice for a bike and definitively not a bike you can depend on. They are only suitable for riding on fairly flat roads. Which is OK for many cities, but it does limit their usefulness. They are what I think of as "novelty bikes". Sure, they are good looking and if you only need to ride around a mostly flat city with good road surfaces, you'll be fine. But a lot of places are not like that. I got tired of riding low quality "novelty bikes" last year and got a hardtail with a Bosch CX motor. Bikes are expensive, so when you do buy a bike and, like me, you are going to ride it all year round, you need something that has "mainstream" parts. Because you are going to wear stuff out. This winter, despite cleaning my bike often (and using appropriate lubricants) I wore out chain, cassette, brakes and a couple of bearings. I rode 10-20 miles per day with lots of elevation both directions) just for work and errands, and on top of that I used the bike for exercise. In anything from 35C and sunshine to snow storms and temperatures as low as -25C (on studded tyres). More often that not the coastal weather where I live is wet cold and hovering somewhere around 0C. Given my use I expect to spend $200-300 per year on stuff that wears out. The real question is how long the really expensive bits, like the motor is going to last. I fully expect to have to tear down the motor in a couple of years to have the bearings replaced and possibly deal with water ingress. But I'm not too worried because given the huge deployed base of Bosch CX motors there is already significant knowledge base on how to deal with problems. If you want to make a good bike that can be a workhorse, you have to start with high volume parts in all the places that are subject to intensive wear. You need something that can be replaced at sensible cost and that bicycle repair shops are likely to have in their inventory. This is especially true for components like the motor. Within 10 minutes bike ride from where I live there are almost half a dozen bike shops that can service my bike. The closest just up the road, located beside the grocery store I visit every day. If I have a problem I can usually get it fixed within a day. Choose bicycles like you architect robust systems. Go for good, well known parts that a lot of people know how to deal with. Don't get fancy unless what you can offer is significantly better under real conditions. In this sense, VanMoof was never a competitive proposition. It was marginal at best. If you want to design a new bike, give careful thought to the system architecture. I think this presents a brilliant learning opportunity.