SRAM has announced the discontinuation of the production of all internal gear hub (IGH), shifters and spare parts. The announcement was made through a letter addressed by the U.S. component maker to its original equipment manufacturer (OEM) customers on Feb. 14, although SRAM said all larger OEM customers had been informed before that letter was mailed. According to market analysts, the decision follows the decline of the market share of bicycles specified with an IGH, which are suffering from the growing popularity of e-bikes. In 2010 SRAM had announced it would relocate the entire IGH production from Schweinfurt in Germany to Taiwan. Effective May 1, 2017 the IGH platforms Automatix, I-Motion 3 and Dual Drive including the Pulse system will be stopped. The production of all other SRAM's IGH's, the T3, P5, S7, G8, I-Motion 9 and E-Matic was stopped earlier. The company invites its customers to send their final orders no later than March 3. Each order will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis and confirmed if it can be fulfilled with available inventory and production capacity. Spare parts will be available as long as in stock, the company said.

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