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Help Fund This Keyless, Solar-Powered Bike Lock


May 15, 2014 | Andy Cush

When you ride a bike in the city, a lock is a necessary evil. They’re bulky, heavy, and can never totally ensure your ride’s safety against a well-armed thief, but what are you going to do — not lock it up?

SkyLock aims to make the bike-locking experience a little smoother. It connects to a smartphone via Bluetooth, so that all you have to do to unlock your bike is press a button on your phone, and it’s solar powered, so the battery won’t run out. There’s also an onboard accelerometer, so that if someone’s tampering with your bike while you’re away, you’ll get a potential theft alert on your phone. SkyLock’s creators are currently looking to crowdfund $50,000 for its development.

As you might imagine, the bike lock of the future is pricey: the company is offering pre-orders at $159, and once funded, SkyLock will retail for $249 — the price of a cheap bike. And no matter how theft-resistant it is, you should probably keep your bike inside whenever you can, anyway.