Chinese conglomerate LeEco just announced two smart bikes here at CES, both which run the company’s customized BikeOS flavor of Android. They’ll be available in the US during the second quarter of 2017, though there’s no word on pricing just yet.
The company’s two new bikes — the Smart Road Bike and the Smart Mountain Bike — each have the sorts of things you need for those respective types of biking: seats, wheels, and carbon fiber frames. They’re both 11-speed bikes, with the Road Bike weighing in at 18.5 pounds and the Mountain Bike a heftier 26.9 pounds.
Retail-ready versions of the company’s ‘Super Bike’
But let’s get to the good stuff. These bikes are essentially the more retail-ready versions of the crazy smart Super Bike that LeEco debuted in October at its big American unveiling event — though that doesn’t mean they’re pedestrian.
Each bike is fitted with a Snapdragon 410-powered 4-inch touchscreen. (Those screens run off a 6,000 mAh removable battery, by the way.) The bikes have turn-by-turn navigation provided by Here Maps, and a walkie-talkie feature that will let you talk to other (compatible) LeEco smart bikes in the area. If you’re not out riding your LeEco smart bike with your friends and their LeEco smart bikes, there’s also online and offline music playback to keep you company.
Totally packed with smarts
That’s not all — the bikes also include a compass, accelerometer, a barometer (!), lights, a horn, an alarm, and they support third party accessories for things like heart rate tracking. And, of course, there’s a social component — the bike and its phone app will log all your rides, and you can share (and show off) all that good data.
Now’s the part where I remind you that LeEco is a company that is trying to do a lot in a short amount of time — including funding (and maybe even outright running) the increasingly ill-fated electric car startup Faraday Future. LeEco wants to make smartphones, VR experiences, self-driving electric cars (that can’t apparently self-drive just yet), and TVs. So just be warned that, should you have dreams of a smart bike, there’s a chance that’s what they’ll remain — dreams.