[TandemGeek]

From VeloNews (and about 56 other sources)....
Canadian outfit buys Cannondale (http://www.velonews.com/article/71784)

Dorel Industries, based in Montreal and parent company of Pacific Cycle, bought Cannondale Bicycle Corporation today in an all-cash deal that is estimated to be valued at between $190 - $200 million.

Pacific Cycle is better known by some of the more famous brands it had acquired before it was acquired by Dorel: Schwinn, GT and Mongoose. Connecticut-based Cannondale along with it's apparel company, Sugoi, was previously acquired by Pegasus Capital Advisors in 2003 for about $80 million ($25m in invested capital before it went bankrupt + $55m for the final acquisition). A pretty tidy profit for Pegasus, to say the least.

According to VeloNews and other sources, Dorel’s recreational/leisure segment will be split into two separate divisions. The Cannondale Sports Group (C'dale, GT, Sugoi, & perhaps Schwinn & Mongoose) will target the independent bicycle dealers and be separate from the mass-market line, Pacific Cycle, InStep, Playsafe and Roadmaster.

The BikeForums.net collector thread is here: http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread.php?t=385114

I posted this here as I'm not sure how many folks like myself never venture outside of the tandem forum and, given how big of a player C'dale has been in the tandem community, it does seem to warrant attention.

[The BikeForums Team]

This is an archived thread, you can find the full version of this thread, with images, links and more content here.

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Cya on the forums,
- The BikeForums Team
- http://www.bikeforums.net

[zonatandem]

Bit of nostalgia . . . from back in the early 80s!
We had the pleasure of doing test riding for 3 months on a Cannondale prototype tandem, about 2 years before the tandem (as a frameset only) became available to the public. At that time they had only 2 prototypes built.
With it's then oversized huge tubing of heat treated aluminum it was the stiffest ride around.
Did not have any decals on the bike and had several folks ask us: 'what is it?' Reply: ' sorry, can't tell you.'
We were quite impressed with the tandem and asked C'dale if they would be willing to build us a custom sized third prototype, and the reply was 'for $10,000 we could;' in other words, a polite 'no.'
However, we were due for a new tandem at that time and the folks at C'dale let us have our needed tandem parts at their cost.
Ended up having our friend, Colin Laing, build us our next 2-seater.
Let's hope the Canadian outfit does a good job, eh!
Pedal on TWOgether!
Rudy and Kay/zonatandem