Specialized and Outside (Pinkbike, Beta etc) Share Same Investment Company

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One Ghost
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One Ghost 1/28/2022 9:38am
1/28/2022 9:38am
Sinyards wife already divorced him and got $245 million. Seems low, more like hush money to me
One Ghost
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One Ghost 1/28/2022 9:39am
1/28/2022 9:39am
sspomer wrote:
via some tweets, came across this website https://zone5ventures.com/#what_we_do says - "Zone 5 Ventures is an early-stage investor with Specialized as our sole limited partner..." https://zone5ventures.com/#portfolio scroll...
via some tweets, came across this website
https://zone5ventures.com/#what_we_do
says - "Zone 5 Ventures is an early-stage investor with Specialized as our sole limited partner..."

https://zone5ventures.com/#portfolio
scroll down the page and Outside is in their portfolio. Outside (formerly Pocket) now owns PB and Beta among other things.

https://zone5ventures.com/#contact_us
on the contact page is this address, which is specialized HQ
MORGAN HILL
15130 Concord Cir
Morgan Hill, CA 95037

The funny thing about Spez now going consumer-direct also is that they are in a buying war for retail shops against Trek. Also, Spez technically owns 1/4 of the Outside group through their venture capital arm. Next, we will see Spez bikes for sale on Pinkbike.
jeff.brines
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jeff.brines 1/29/2022 4:53am
1/29/2022 4:53am
One Ghost wrote:
The funny thing about Spez now going consumer-direct also is that they are in a buying war for retail shops against Trek. Also, Spez technically owns...
The funny thing about Spez now going consumer-direct also is that they are in a buying war for retail shops against Trek. Also, Spez technically owns 1/4 of the Outside group through their venture capital arm. Next, we will see Spez bikes for sale on Pinkbike.
Where are you seeing they own 1/4 of outside?
Masjo
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Masjo 1/29/2022 8:33am
1/29/2022 8:33am
I think the 'Specialzed owns 1/4 of Outside' keeps coming from the fact that Outside had 4 series A investors, one of whom was Zone5 which is run by Specialized employees. No one has yet to come up with an actual dollar value at this point. The closest we have is CyclingTips saying they are a 'minor investor'. So is Lance Armstrong's Next Ventures: https://cyclingtips.com/commercial-disclosures/
If you go further into CrunchBase, you can see that the other Series A investors are signify bigger than Zone5, with larger and more investments. That doesn't tell us how much they put forward, but it's likely they would have the capability to invest more than Zone 5.

Also, what does Specialized gain from this if they did make Pinkbike/CyclingTips/whoever only say there bikes are good? If something was bad on their bike, all of the other publications would point it out and now the influence is incredibly obvious and it crashes the reputation of Outside. I know they own some of the biggest bike news outlets but they don't control the market.
lewzz10
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lewzz10 1/30/2022 6:18am
1/30/2022 6:18am
I listened to a PB podcast recently and they commented on this (fair play to them), said they didn't know about it and learnt in their own comments.

Said they'd have to comment and potentially add disclosure etc.

Admitted it was embarrassing that Cycling tips knew and they didn't.

Made bold statements about handing in their notices if ever influence was exerted on editorial.

Still doesn't look great.
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bman33
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bman33 2/1/2022 10:59am
2/1/2022 10:59am Edited Date/Time 2/1/2022 11:06am
One Ghost wrote:
One way to own the market is to own the media. Look at what FOX and OAN did for the GOP. They influenced a generation of...
One way to own the market is to own the media. Look at what FOX and OAN did for the GOP. They influenced a generation of voters.

How can we sell more bikes AND make sure our competitors don’t get favorable media time? 🤔 I know! We buy as many media outlets at once!
While Sorros and team own every other major outlet and shill for the Dems. 99% of politicians are full of sh*t regardless of letter by their name. That said, this isn't Pinkbike, keep that garbage over there. We can all agree Specialized is a shady company and leave it at that
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specializedenduro777 7/16/2022 2:57pm
7/16/2022 2:57pm Edited Date/Time 7/16/2022 4:01pm
Pinkbike is full of toxic incel bike nerds with no moderation

Only good to buy used bikes there

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Sneakerhead Dentistry 7/17/2022 6:19am
7/17/2022 6:19am
specializedenduro777 wrote:
Pinkbike is full of toxic incel bike nerds with no moderation

Only good to buy used bikes there

Your first post on Vital is full of moderation, with no nerds, Skittles and, a used bike.

Vital may now need a new catagory - Off the Bike w/ Mike Vandeman & Co.
Big Bird
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Big Bird 7/17/2022 8:59am
7/17/2022 8:59am
specializedenduro777 wrote:
Pinkbike is full of toxic incel bike nerds with no moderation

Only good to buy used bikes there

Oh yeah? I got ripped off for $800 on a Pink Bike frame deal.
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specializedenduro777 7/17/2022 9:33pm
7/17/2022 9:33pm
specializedenduro777 wrote:
Pinkbike is full of toxic incel bike nerds with no moderation

Only good to buy used bikes there

Big Bird wrote:
Oh yeah? I got ripped off for $800 on a Pink Bike frame deal.
Damn really?! didn’t use PayPal?
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DirkT
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DirkT 7/18/2022 2:36pm
7/18/2022 2:36pm
One Ghost wrote:
One way to own the market is to own the media. Look at what FOX and OAN did for the GOP. They influenced a generation of...
One way to own the market is to own the media. Look at what FOX and OAN did for the GOP. They influenced a generation of voters.

How can we sell more bikes AND make sure our competitors don’t get favorable media time? 🤔 I know! We buy as many media outlets at once!
bman33 wrote:
While Sorros and team own every other major outlet and shill for the Dems. 99% of politicians are full of sh*t regardless of letter by their...
While Sorros and team own every other major outlet and shill for the Dems. 99% of politicians are full of sh*t regardless of letter by their name. That said, this isn't Pinkbike, keep that garbage over there. We can all agree Specialized is a shady company and leave it at that
I think that a citation is needed here.
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westeast
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westeast 7/23/2022 11:33am
7/23/2022 11:33am
So we're concerned about a potential partial ownership by Specialized of PB having an influence on bike reviews, but we also think that some network news sources are clearly carrying water for only one political party while the other network news sources are objective unbiased news sources?

I'm not concerned about Specialized owning part of PB (directly or indirectly), but it probably should be disclosed. I think most of us know that Specialized spends a lot of advertising dollars and some influence may come with that over the reviewers. That said, I think most reviewers try to be objective and unbiased. We also have the comments and user reviews (not to mention friends) that carry as much or more weight than a review from a for profit publication.
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