Preston bike shop, Melbourne — 2017.
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EV1 to EV5. Five versions of the same brief.
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Auren EV1 Prototype 2018
The EV5. Five generations in.
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Designing a life on two wheels.
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02
Where it started
I grew up in Melbourne
with bikes — it's just
how I moved.
My relationship with bikes changed when I decided to study Mechanical Engineering at NYU Abu Dhabi — driven by a desire to see more of the world and get a broader education than a traditional university path would offer.
During my degree, I ran the bikeshare program for NYU across both New York and Abu Dhabi, and worked alongside the city bikeshare program in Abu Dhabi. Seeing how a well-run bike network could shift the way people moved around a city stuck with me. At the same time, travelling through places like Cairo and Mumbai made it clear how badly cars can break down mobility as populations grow. The car isn't a solution that scales.
When I came back to Melbourne, I started working in a bike shop while figuring out next steps. E-bikes were just starting to gain traction in Australia, and I wondered if this was finally the thing that could get people out of their cars.
But more than ninety percent of the enquiries we were getting came from two groups: elderly riders and food delivery workers. Barely anyone was actually replacing their commute.
Before even riding the bikes, I could see why. Clunky motors, oversized frames, an aesthetic that said "utility" in the least flattering sense. A professional arriving at the office on one of those things would have felt conspicuous in a way most people weren't willing to be.
The engineering felt uninspired and half-baked. Working in the workshop, I watched the same failures repeat: cassette gears worn through after a month, chainrings bent from motor torque, derailleurs snapping under loads they were never designed for. A conventional derailleur and a mid-drive motor are fundamentally incompatible — and almost every e-bike on the market combined exactly those two things.
Auren EV1 Prototype 2018
Electric cars had faced the same problem once. Dorky, unreliable, designed around virtue rather than desire. The answer there wasn't tuning. It was a complete rethink.
Everything I'd seen in Melbourne and overseas pointed to the same conclusion: the e-bike that gets people out of their cars doesn't exist yet. I should build it.
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The EV5
The name isn't branding.
It's a version number.
The EV5 is the fifth iteration of the same brief I set myself in 2018: build an e-bike good enough to replace the car commute — and that people actually want to ride. Every generation incorporated rider feedback, new components, and lessons from the version before. The belt drive has been there from the beginning, because chains are where most people's relationship with bike maintenance starts and ends. Geometry was refined for easy step-through in work clothes. Lights and mudguards were integrated into the frame rather than clamped on as an afterthought.
The automatic gearbox.
The automatic gearbox is the part I'd been working toward since the start. By combining the motor and gears into a single sealed unit, they interact directly — no gear cables, no compatibility problems, no derailleur being asked to shift under 50Nm of motor torque.
The system shifts without rider input. It picks the right gear for the gradient and the speed. You pedal; it handles the rest.
Once you've ridden automatic, going back feels like driving a manual in traffic. You can — it just raises the question of why.
The price.
Getting a million people out of their cars means the bike has to be affordable. A $10,000 commuter e-bike is an enthusiast product. At $4,400, the EV5 is a decision someone can make without losing sleep over it.
That price is possible because I sell direct. No retailers taking margin, no showroom overhead. I work out of a garage. For Melbourne deliveries, I drive the van myself. Every dollar I don't spend on distribution is a dollar I can put into components — or take off the price.
It's not a constraint I'm working around. It's how the mission is supposed to work.
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A personal note
Some of the times I appreciate bikes most are the moments I find myself in a car.
Stuck in traffic, watching the lane next to me sit just as still, I'm reminded that this is what most people's mornings look like — and that it doesn't have to be.
I've spent years designing my life so the majority of my trips happen on two wheels. The EV5 is the bike I built to make that possible for someone else, without asking them to overhaul their life to do it.
If you've got questions about whether it's right for you, get in touch directly.
