10 Years of Tubolito

How an idea became a new product category

In 2016, the bicycle tube was the most overlooked component on the bike. While frames, wheels, and drivetrains had long been reimagined through materials research, the tire still relied on a butyl tube, the same kind that had been around for decades. That is exactly where our founders, Akos and Christian, started – not with a market analysis, but with a simple question.

“We had years of experience with the plastic TPU, so the question for us wasn’t why we could use TPU as a material – it was why bicycle tubes were still made of butyl in the first place,” Akos recalls.

From the start, TPU was surrounded by stubborn myths. Probably the biggest one: that light means fragile. That’s butyl thinking – and it simply isn’t true for TPU. Our S-Tubo technology is 80% lighter than butyl tubes, with the same level of durability. Another persistent assumption is that TPU tubes can’t be repaired, when in fact they can be patched easily with the right patch. And the idea that plastic can’t be environmentally friendly doesn’t hold up either: as a thermoplastic, TPU is recyclable and performs significantly better for the environment than butyl.

Still, the road to a market-ready product was no sprint: a tube has to withstand tens of thousands of load cycles and cannot fail at a single seam. Since no suitable machinery or standards existed, Akos and Christian developed the manufacturing processes and equipment themselves, from the ground up.

There were external challenges too – Covid above all, first as a demand boom that overwhelmed supply chains, then as a prolonged market slump in which retailers, buried under excess stock, had little focus left for a small item like a tube. Even so, giving up was never an option: the positive feedback from riders was confirmation enough.

Today, we’re proud to have pioneered TPU bicycle tubes and created an entirely new category in cycling. Seeing our products used at the Olympic Games, world championships, and in everyday life by cyclists everywhere is the best confirmation of our work. Thank you to the incredible cycling community for trusting our products!

Despite these achievements, we’re convinced: we’re nowhere near done. There are still many directions we’re exploring, and plenty of parameters left to optimize. So there will keep being innovative products from Tubolito. We can’t wait to see what the next 10 years bring.