DVO Suspension - Birth Of A Brand
 | DVO is short for 'Developed Suspension' and represents the mindset we have as we engineer, design, and deliver fully developed suspension products that are 100%. - Bryson Martin |
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 Serious firepower - Team DVO. |
30 years plus industry veteran Bryson Martin, owner of Bryson Martin Racing along with Tom Rogers, John Pelino, Josh Baltaxe and Bryson Martin Jr will launch DVO Developed Suspension during the Taiwan Bike Week held in Taichung Taiwan November 2012. They will have a booth at the Splendor Hotel in Taichung during Bike Week.
Bryson and his team were long time Marzocchi employees; they left in May 2012 amid struggles with Tenneco upper management and the direction of the company's mountain bike suspension business. Bryson Martin was the founder of Marzocchi USA and was the inspiration for the successful Bomber line as well as many other iconic models over the past 23 years.
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| Tom Rogers and Bryson Martin slap on some cool grey 9C. |
| After losing our supplier SR Suntour and not having a back up plan, I felt that the future with Marzocchi would be extremely difficult. Going my own direction with my own suspension program is the way forward. - Bryson Martin |
The new DVO Suspension Team consists of Tom Rogers who is a long time industry veteran and former World Cup racer. Tom worked at Manitou for ten years during their glory days and then nearly ten years at Marzocchi focusing on damper designs. John Pelino was at Marzocchi for 16 years handling operations, after market sales and distribution support. Josh Baltaxe has a graduate degree in Engineering and is a passionate bike rider; he brings the brains and science to all our designs. Bryson Martin Jr is a pro DH racer and business student and will help in tuning, marketing and race support.
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| Getting work done in the new space. |
Bryson along with his USA based engineering team brings over 80 years of suspension building experiencing and will launch some very cool and innovative suspension products purely focused on the long travel market.
| We started with a clean sheet of paper but didn't look to re-invent the wheel. We addressed some critical areas of current suspension design to enhance performance while making it easier for the consumer to tune or service their own fork if desired. - Bryson Martin |
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| Before he can start designing the future, Baltaxe needs to build the boxes. |
With regard to the competition, it has been a long time since a new company has entered the high-end suspension business of this magnitude, both Rock Shox and Fox the industry leaders have been doing a great job for years.
| We feel that the dominance of Fox and Rock Shox has been because there hasn't been enough good competitors to give them a run for their money. DVO Suspension will be gunning for the top. - John Pelino |
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| Bryson Martin Jr sends it. Whistler, BC. Photo by Colin Meagher |
In order to become a player in the suspension business you need to have a solid manufacturing base and SR Suntour, the world's largest suspension maker, will install a dedicated production line to assemble the complete line of DVO products (forks and shocks). “SR Suntour is an amazing company with a rich history in the bicycle business, although they are currently known for making low to mid priced suspension, they also produced a lot of great high end products and were once a main player in the early days of mountain bike components” “I’ve worked with SR Suntour for decades, they are passionate about building high end products and have dedicated themselves to making sure DVO Suspension will be a success” says Bryson”. Furthermore, the President of SR Suntour Daisuke Kobayashi rides thousands of kilometers each year, not too many company presidents have the passion like he does for bikes.
| We will also launch a very informative web site helping riders better understand the dynamics of suspension in general while providing extensive information on tuning and setting up all of the DVO products. Providing detailed information on our web site and backing up our products with excellent customer service will be key! - Bryson Martin Jr. |
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| DVO Swag - check. Word is, patents are pending so you'll have to wait until November before DVO releases the hounds. |
For 2013 DVO Suspension will be working with DH Teams and individual riders while heading to as many races and events as possible. The goal is to support some top World Cup DH Teams in the near future. “We will also work on other market segments within the suspension business and focus purely on the performance aspect.” says Bryson. DVO Suspension is located in Valencia California and is a rider owned and operated company.
Contact: info@dvosuspension.com
29033 Ave. Sherman Suite 203 Valencia, Ca 91355 USA
661-295-9500
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if you look back into bicycle manufacturing history, specifically in BMX you would see how much money brands like Hutch USA made from selling 'swag' (t-shirts, caps, stickers) before making a single frame or crankset
legend has it that they made so much money selling their swag at BMX races, it actually paid for their setup costs
very interesting news!
best of luck in your new venture, and don't forget the burgeoning 29'er market as us riders on the wagon wheelers also appreciate high end suspension product
can you say, or what your going to be releasing? even just a vague idea?
if i could get a 1.5 head with 180mm id totally buy it!
So we can expect the same manufacturing quality of the current 888's (fantastic!) with uninterrupted creativity and design from some VERY experienced players. This actually sounds good to me. Is a very similar story to how BOSS started back in the day, and although BOSS may not be main stream in MTB's currently. They have thrived in every sport they have focused on.
Best of luck DVO! I will certainly give you a try if i can afford it.... Maybe we'll actually see the next evolutionary step of the Shiver from these guys.
Steering precision and small-bump sensitivity are the most important characteristics for ride quality in a DH fork in my opinion. If you are in the ball-park for weight, then that is secondary in my opinion.
Same goes for rockshox with their blackgold stanchions, Even we (non pro riders) like those kind of things.
The exclusivity for the newest parts, takes to long, and is to hard to get.
If there's one company anyone could take some inspiration from it's Hope tech! I know tons of people who ride those brakes and hubs,... They always work, Every part is replaceable, you can order it separately, has a superb finish, you'll have the same parts as the highest end racers, and still lots of choice to customize. (custom color or laser etching for the sponsored riders is the way to go imo).
Some look and feel I like in the hope brakes, I can relate to the factory feel of a bos fork. But those are hard to find, parts even harder to find, expensive,..
And one last remark, Titanium is the material of choice for a high end spring, They're still to rare, (especially rockshox, fox springs). Cane creek can have them for their shocks, and have nice website as well, but it's still to expensive. It's a spring, and again if you compare it to hope parts, where you pay for good machining, best choice of materials, and a well thought over design. A spring is just a coil (even though it's in an expensive material and needs work too). If Diverse can do It, others should be able too.
just wanted to spit this out, cause in my opinion there's still to much of a strange approach on suspension marketing.
These days, to correctly set up your suspension, you have to know how it works and what it does, so tuning it at home isn't that far off, Marzocchi did a good job with the replaceable shimstack (even though I have no clue, how and to what I'll better change it to). Props to Cane Creek who arguably have the most complicated shock, and does the best job of explaining it on their web site. So in my eyes: Explain everything till everybody knows how to set it up, even if you don't own one. Provide parts easily, that everybody who needs some for his fork, wishes he had bought yours, Leave some kind of room to customize "the look", don't overrate R&D: every piece of paper as the need to have some, and if you get a napkin, you don't want to pay the cost to come up with the idea.
Only wanting to go with long travel suspension, makes me believe at the moment, that R&D is there to suit the needs of the market, not the need to get rich.
Much appreciated for all the answers in the comments section. It's cool to see you addressing all the PB chatter, fast and free. I spent more time reading your responses than I did with the article. Best of luck.
People are to attached to certian brands ( blind faith ) these days to join an unknown company , regardless of the awesome team behind it. ( in my opinon )
Maybe once DVO have made some stuff and can afford to pay a top rider to use them it will kick off for them.
Looking at x-fusion is a good example , they make apparently good quality kit at good prices , yet they are still not considered a top brand by most.
But just like others have said, I really hope they put out a great product at a great price if for no other reason than to add some competition to the other companies. It can only be a good thing for the riders. Better products and pricing for all because right now most of it is hugely overpriced.
To beat Fox & RS business-wise or quality-wise ?
Quality-wise they'd better look after some real techy products like BOS suspension ! ;-)
The problem with this strategy is that i know alot of guys who are giving up mountainbiking these days due to the ridiculous cost of the equipment. Tempt them back into the sport with the best technology at the best prices....and do it for the sports sake....
this is all we need:
1) has at min equal performance to fox (lets face it, fox performs well enough).
2) same weight.
3) cheaper.
thats all the sport needs. these incremental upgrades of fox's makes virtually no difference to performance of most riders. just ask local bike shops. when you cross question them theyre the first to tell of the great mountainbike technology swindle.
yeah, with all kinds of "lifestyle" bling, like huge monster trucks, "business use" motos, etc.
quit lying Bryson. you Cali dorks are all about glitz, glamour and bling. I wager $20 you will make the most ridiculous rapper look like a dirt-eater.
I am open to any product testing you require for the UK.
www.north-bristol-mountain-bike-club.co.uk
I'd like to see an inverted air sprung fork, because I think it could be super light, and due to the nature of inverted forks, could still get killer small bump sensitivity.
I'd also love to see a sick 180mm, air sprung, single slammer like an improved Talas, or 66 SL, and do like the CCDB Air (which I love) and include air chamber spacers to tune progressiveness. One other thing, please please please! take the damn knobs off the bottom of the fork where they're always gettin' broke off!
Many thanks for the past stuff, and best of luck!
- xFusion? Formula? really, come on guys. do keep up with the industry happenings.
and why be politically correct? seize the thing by the jugular. too much faffing around and PC talk. people should quit the BS poppytwaddle and get right to it.
good luck with this, I love seeing startups get on with things. I really hope you destroy everything in your path, giving us reliability and great performance in the process. just having more choice, assuming the quality range is reasonable, is a start
ps - shouldn't a website come before gack in the order of priorities?
Had trouble with those 2008-2009 series forks and still don't trust Marz at this point.
Been running Rockshox and Fox on each of my bikes for the last 2 years.
But they too have areas where they fall short.
Sounds like your team is committed to the quality of the product and less interested vampire girl adds.
Great start.
If you can make me a high quaintly product with no dumbed down adjustments, stanchion size that makes scene for durability and weight at a price point comparable or better than the big boys right now I'd give it a go.
No brand name/ hype marketing machine loyalty here.
Just loyalty to quality products that perform and get me out riding instead of dealing with warranty issues.
Good luck and looking forward to seeing you first products.
and please no skimpy bints in your show booths, just product that works
FWIW my Marz 55 (2011) is the best fork I've ever ridden. Expecting great things from this company
I'm quite interested to see what you come up with on the forks side, as it's usually easier to make shocks than forks. But you have a great manufacturing tool at your reach to offer both. I wish you had something to show us already. So don't waste too much energy talking, shut down Pinkbike, and go do some real work
DVO will be SERVICED at this location so you all can bet the customer service will be top notch. They will be in touch with consumers more than any 'STARBUCKS BRANDED" fork company.
Hope they outdo the 66 RCV. Really hated that POS.
you can also use the same address for some forks too.....we have some demanding tracks here thatll test them nicely! if you want to of course? lol
"Its time to tip things upside down and hit the market hard."
Hmmm....very interesting.