By Tracey Swinehart, VP, Finance – UBCO
UBCO are award winning innovators who turned an electric farm bike idea into a globally intelligent vehicle platform with a diverse customer base, and manufacturing strategy to support significant growth.
Can you tell us a little more about UBCO, the customers you serve, and a bit about your journey so far?
UBCO’s concept originated in a Wairarapa shed, based on the idea of a rugged Utility Electric Vehicle that would transform the way people ride, work and play. It was here in New Zealand that we could provide the harshest testing environment, out on Kiwi farms with some of the hardest workers in the world. Since its 2015 launch, UBCO has rapidly developed into an intelligent vehicle platform providing adventure to more people than ever before.
We have almost 4,000 2-wheel-drive bikes in key markets, loved for all sorts of uses from working the land, exploring outback and surfing, to commuting, food delivery and filming. We’re now expanding our customer base, our product line, and our geographic reach with a particular focus on the US. Our manufacturing operations are spread across New Zealand, Asia (Taiwan centre) and the US, supported by a supply chain team that has grown substantially over the last year to support increased production.
How did your relationship with the EMA come about?
The EMA have always been on our radar as a manufacturing business supporter, so our relationship started very early on. Over the years, we have been attending monthly meetings, presenting and sharing our manufacturing experience at forums, and it’s great to be a member of the new Bay of Plenty Exporting Committee.
In what way/s does the EMA support UBCO?
The networking opportunities are really valuable for supporting each other with collaboration opportunities. Hearing from other businesses on their challenges and the clever ways they are going about things offers good inspiration. We also take advantage of the employers’ advice and enjoy access to policy influencers at events and via EMA’s Advocacy work.
We understand UBCO has experienced some impressive growth in recent years, can you tell us a bit more about this?
UBCO has almost tripled its revenue year-on-year, growing its team from less than 20 to 100 in the last two years across the US, Europe, Australia, Asia and here in Tauranga. We signed up over 60 dealers in the US to sell our vehicles – and a partnership with powersports giant, Tucker Powersports, will add 200 more under our banner this year.
To put that into perspective, in New Zealand, we have about 30 dealers and 20 service agents after about five years in market. The commercial side of our business has grown with customers in tourism, the public sector, conservation, and we now have almost 70 vehicles with NZ Domino’s Pizza Delivery.
How have the needs of your customers changed since UBCO began operating?
We are extremely fortunate to have had an awesome early adopter base here in New Zealand, centred mainly around the farming community. They really pushed our earlier models to their limits and have been instrumental in getting the product to where it is today. Our customer base has really diversified from being utility focused, to people wanting to use UBCOs for a range of things – including commuting and leisure. In particular, over the last year or so, we’ve found strong product-market fit in the growing adventure space.
What impact, if any, has COVID had on your services, team and customers?
Being a hardware start-up at any time is tough. But we’ve really had to innovate over the last few years with increased pressures on the supply and movement of product and parts. Our supply chain spans our key geographies with lots of activity around Taiwan for parts sourcing etc. In the wake of COVID, we’ve also seen a much more conservative capital market. Being a capital-hungry hardware start-up means we must be sensitive to these changes and find ways of adjusting.
Are there any services or products you were supplying pre-COVID that needed to be adapted, or any services that have become a higher priority?
Like many, we had to improvise where needed in finding alternative suppliers and systems. Something that will really shift the dial for us, in terms of both securing parts and production capacity, is a strategic and equity-based partnership with TPK, heavyweights in supply chain and manufacturing, which offers us forward-ordering and stabilises parts supply.
We also had to accelerate our e-commerce rollout as we had a heavy focus on events and face to face interaction prior to COVID. We now have an excellent D2C (Direct to Consumer) system in place where our road registerable bikes are delivered directly to customers, and all the digital infrastructure that comes with this. Impacted roles, like events, were redirected to support this.
What does the future look like for UBCO?
Growing our customer base in the US is a big priority given the underlying market trends, and the fit with a range of our target personas. Within the next two years, we’re scaling up production substantially by launching two new models and targeting profitability – which is superb for a hardware start-up! We’ll be growing beyond our core audience in new markets – which brings more competition, but with our unique proposition, will thrive.
What is the best piece of advice you can give to New Zealand businesses and manufacturers to help them on their journey?
Don’t let being a small New Zealand company dial back your aspirations. Though we’re a small New Zealand start-up, we pitch ourselves against the ‘big guns’ in the EV and automobile space, and the very busy micro mobility space. This keeps us on our toes, but increasingly, we’re finding out where we are ahead of the game and learning from where we aren’t. We’ve never shied away from our big goal – to grow the US$50bn powersports market to $150bn. Of course, we must temper our growth, be strategic with where we put our efforts and resources, but the end goal is still big.
For more information, please visit – https://ubco.com/
