"No Trails - No Sales": this was the motto of Infotech 2025, which took place at the Seminarhotel Sempachersee in Nottwil at the beginning of the third week of January. For the first time, the audience had a say in which seminars at the hybrid event would be recorded. The video clips and the recording of the forum can be viewed on demand in the Velosuisse Academy at velosuisse.ch. In terms of audience attendance, Infotech 2025 fell short of the organizers' expectations, which was not surprising given the market situation.
In addition to the 302 seminars, the highlight of the two-day training event for the bicycle trade was the high-profile forum discussion on Monday evening. Ursula Wyss, former member of the National Council, economist with a doctorate and former head of civil engineering and architect of the city of Berne's cycling offensive, called on the cycling associations in her input speech to demand adequate cycling infrastructure more confidently and with more emphasis. She said: "The voters decided at the ballot box that they want more cycling. Politicians now have a duty to meet this demand and have the appropriate infrastructure built. Around 60 percent of the population would like to cycle more. However, a non-existent and dangerous cycle path infrastructure acts as a deterrent." Catherine Elliot, head of the ETH project "E-Bike City", which analyzed Zurich's potential as a cycling city, wishes that cities would be more willing to experiment with cycling infrastructure. FEDRO Director Jürg Röthlisberger, on the other hand, was of the opinion that most road users travel opportunistically with different modes of transport and that it is therefore counterproductive to play off the modes of transport - for example cars and bicycles - against each other.
The economically sluggish situation in the bike industry with high stock levels and tight liquidity was also reflected in the number of visitors to Infotech, which fell short of the organizers' expectations. Around 700 day tickets were sold on both days. The change of ownership meant that there were no representatives from well-known heavyweights such as the former Migros subsidiaries Bike World and SportXX, whose employees had attended Infotech in large numbers last year. In addition, a number of businesses closed for financial or age reasons because no successor could be found. The psychological aspect of having to deal with new products again with full stocks is also likely to have deterred quite a few retailers from visiting Infotech.
"The declining sales trend in the bicycle trade was foreseeable after another suboptimal first half of 2024 in terms of weather. However, the significantly increased advertising expenditure for Infotech did not quite achieve the success we had hoped for," says Velosuisse Managing Director Martin Platter, who is responsible for the organization. He adds: "After last year's good result, we wanted to break the thousand mark in terms of day tickets sold this time. This target has now been postponed until the next event." The next Infotech will take place on January 12 and 13, 2026.
Nottwil, January 14, 2025