Avocet was a distribution company that was very successful in bringing some very good products to market; their saddles, tyres, and computers were ubiquitous and they still focus on tyres, shoes, saddles, and computers but there is a lot more competition now.

The Avocet Cross tyre was one of my favourites and I am fortunate to have found some NOS and they have recently been put back in production as the Cross 2.

Shimano's Biopace was a sound design but a marketing failure.

Zeus made some rather beautiful components and some were copies of Campagnolo and it is suspected that they also worked as a contractor for them... when the Japanees came to dominate the cycling world most of the European companies folded or merged and Zeus was a victim of that while Campagnolo was lucky to have lasted long enough to catch up.