Video: Pyga Moves Aluminium Manufacturing Home to South Africa

PRESS RELEASE: Pyga Mountain Bikes

2019 has been a momentous year for us as it has seen the realization of a dream to bring manufacturing back home to Pietermaritzburg, South Africa. A fitting place to manufacture mountain bikes given its strong ties to both the roots and greatest achievements of the sport in South Africa.


The journey into manufacturing started a long time ago for Patrick Morewood, the founder and co-owner of Pyga. In his early years as a competitive downhill racer, equipment was always a challenge and coming from a long line of designers and engineers Pat continued the tradition by designing and building his own components. This then culminated in full-blown bicycle design and manufacture with what would become the world-renowned and critically acclaimed Morewood Bikes brand in 1998.


After some 15 years with Morewood, Patrick moved on to form Pyga in 2012 with the express idea to design bikes that were more accessible and rewarding to the average rider not only those competing at the top level. This saw the birth of the iconic Pyga Oneten29. These aluminum frames were manufactured in the East under Pat's supervision and watchful eye; the first batch were worked on in China, by Pat himself.

We moved on as a brand growing its range to encompass XC, Marathon, Trail and Enduro bikes and branching into carbon frames, the Stage, which rode to victory in the 2019 Absa Cape Epic’s Queen stage, piloted by Local team riders Matthys Beukes and Phil Buys.



In late January 2019, the final decision was taken to establish our own bespoke factory. This started the search for machines and tools both old and new and within three short months, we had a fully functional aluminum bicycle factory. Two months thereafter we had our first prototypes and in October 2019 we shipped our first production frames out of our own factory, an accomplishment of which we are very proud.




The ability to now control our future in terms of quality, improvements, and delivery are truly game-changing for us. In a world of increased commoditization and mass production to deliver a truly artisan, handmade frame to our customers is the dream all of us at Pyga subscribe to. Our aspiration to become a globally recognized, high end, mountain bike brand is vastly enhanced by the establishment of our own factory.

The freedom the factory gives us to prototype and move quickly to market with new models is a luxury one does not always achieve with outsourced manufacturing. With a current capacity to manufacture in the region of 1200 frames per annum and offer a vast array of customizable colours via our powder coating plant, we can offer a truly personal product to the customer.


Believing in better is something we live and breathe at Pyga and to truly deliver on this manufacturing frames in our own factory is an essential element. In a South African context with increased negativity and a doom and gloom mentality prevailing we are determined to become one of the many good news stories and centers of excellence in South Africa.


The first ride on our locally produced frames was an incredibly fulfilling and somewhat emotional moment, one that is only surpassed by seeing the genuine smiles and stoke on the faces of our customers once they swing a leg over one of our locally produced bikes.


pygaindustries.com

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