Are Specialized Mountain Bike frames made by Giant?
by Rob Chrin on Saturday, December 5th, 2009 | 5 Comments
I recently bought a new Specialized mountain bike and was later told I could have saved a lot of money by purchasing a Giant mountain bike instead because the Specialized frames are made by Giant. Is this true?
Specialized are built by Merida, a competitor of Giant in Taiwan. Some of the confusion comes from several years ago when Giant used the Horst link on their NRS race bikes. Specialized holds the patent on the Horst link, and Giant had to pay a royalty to use the design.
some are and some are not
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Lots of Specialized frames are made by Giant, especially for lower-end bikes, but it’s probably not true that you would have saved "a lot of money" by buying a Giant instead of Specialized. At a given price point, Giant and Specialized are usually very similar in terms of parts, quality, etc.
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i dont believe so. i dont think you would save that much money getting a giant anyway. im the kind of guy that would pay extra just to get the branding. Specialized just sound cooler.
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Maybe. But I think Specialized designs the bike and contracts the manufacturing to Giant, if anything. Giant cannot just use Specialized’s designs for their own brand.
e.g. Some of Specialized’s MTBs have curved downtubes. You never see them on a Giant!
Don’t worry. Specialized bikes are among the best in their price range!
References :
Specialized are built by Merida, a competitor of Giant in Taiwan. Some of the confusion comes from several years ago when Giant used the Horst link on their NRS race bikes. Specialized holds the patent on the Horst link, and Giant had to pay a royalty to use the design.
References :