Ford Motor Company Bike Rack Patent

Ford Motor Company has notably been in the bicycle news lately as the title sponsor of the San Francisco bike share program Ford GoBike. But the company’s recent patent application for a Retractable Bicycle Carrier is geared towards those that own both cars and bikes.

The patent application – published Jul 6 2017 – details a retractable bicycle carrier. While the specs and drawings in the patent are installed on a Ford Mustang, the text of the patent clearly indicates this as a device intended for any vehicle.

A bicycle carrier system for a vehicle includes a rail assembly configured for translation between a stored position within a vehicle fascia and a fully deployed position. The rail assembly includes one or more sliding rails each carrying a plurality of pivoting anchors.

Of course this is just a patent application and there is no real indication that this will ever come to market. It is also not the first time we’ve seen automakers experiment with bicycle centric autos. But Ford seems to be doing more and more in the area of bicycles.

Because we view ourselves, both as an automotive company, and as a mobility company

— http://www.digitaltrends.com/cool-tech/ford-unveils-latest-e-bike/

In addition to the Ford GoBike partnership mentioned above, the company had previously been working into the bicycle market in a much more direct manner. The MoDe:Flex was a prototype smart bike reported on VeloReviews. Perhaps Ford is hedging its bets about where transportation is heading in the future.