India’s electricity grid is struggling to accommodate the nation’s economic expansion and isn’t adequately equipped to handle future data center demand. Goldman Sachs estimates that power required from utilities needs roughly 7.2% annual growth between fiscal years 2025 and 2035, up from a prior 5.6%.
India’s data center base sits in the low single gigawatts today, but Bernstein forecasts reach 5 to 6 gigawatts by 2030. AI servers draw five to seven times the power of a legacy server rack, according to HSBC. Solar farms can be built in 12 to 24 months, but they flood the grid when daytime demand is comparatively low and then fade as households and commercial loads climb after 5 PM. On Goldman’s full-year models, the system runs a 1 to 4% energy deficit by fiscal years 2034 through 2035.
Assessments suggest India may need roughly 140 gigawatts of additional coal capacity by fiscal year 2035 versus 2023 levels. The government’s current target is roughly 87 gigawatts by fiscal year 2032. Coal plants can run around the clock and can ramp up production during the evening hours to meet surging demand. Some of this coal is bridge capacity to stabilize a faster greening grid, but the scale required exceeds what policymakers have publicly acknowledged or what most analysts expected even two years ago.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Rapha and EF Pro Cycling have announced they are parting ways after seven years, bringing one of cycling’s most distinctive partnerships to an end.
Since 2019, the collaboration has “disrupted” the world of cycling, according to EF Pro Cycling founder and CEO Jonathan Vaughters, with the alternative racing calendar and headline-grabbing jerseys, including the famous duck.
“We made some noise, and brought new people into our sport along the way. To me, that is the hallmark of a successful partnership,” says Vaughters.
Rapha and EF Pro Cycling moved beyond the typical WorldTour events, with the team’s athletes taking on races such as Unbound Gravel and the Leadville Trail 100 MTB.
Much of the partnership’s success outside WorldTour races is down to one athlete in particular, Lachlan Morton.
The Australian has taken on many challenges since the partnership began, which were captured in the Gone Racing documentary series between 2019 and 2022.
One of Morton’s biggest challenges was the Alt Tour, which saw him cycle the 2021 Tour de France route unsupported, beating the peloton to Paris by five days.
This year, Morton set a new record from Auckland to Wellington in New Zealand. The feat was documented in a film that Rapha later issued an apology over because it neglected to mention one of the previous record holders.
The partnership made EF Pro Cycling one of the sport’s most recognisable teams through its bold kit designs, particularly at the Giro d’Italia, where the team had to ride in special kit so its typical pink didn’t clash with the leader’s jersey.
While there were often interesting designs for the Giro d’Italia – including a kit that used excess fabric and another one that celebrated people from different nations – the most eye-catching was the 2020 kit designed in collaboration with the skateboarding brand Palace.
The kit grabbed people’s attention thanks to its psychedelic patterns and one cap-wearing duck, which also informed the design of the team’s time-trial helmets.
Rapha and EF Pro Cycling also collaborated for the 2022 Tour de France and Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift to mark the return of the women’s race after 30 years.
Although EF Pro Cycling and Rapha made a name for themselves through off-beat challenges and loud kit, the partnership has still seen success in professional road races.
The team has secured stage victories at all three Grand Tours, as well as wins at the Tour of Flanders and Paris–Roubaix Femmes.
EF Pro Cycling has had notable success in 2025. Magdeleine Vallieres recently won the women’s world championships road race in Kigali, Rwanda, while Ben Healy finished third in the men’s race.
This year, Healy became the first Irishman to wear the yellow jersey at the Tour de France since Stephen Roche in 1987, and finished the race in ninth position overall.
The end of the partnership means Rapha is leaving the WorldTour for the time being, according to the brand’s CEO, Fran Millar.
“EF Pro Cycling has a unique spirit which we will always respect and champion. But we have made the decision to broaden our horizons and increase our impact across other, progressive areas of elite and participation cycling. This does not mark the end of our support for the world’s most talented and charismatic riders. The next chapter begins now,” says Millar.
Vaughters says: “It’s an exciting time to be at EF Pro Cycling and we can’t wait to keep building on one of our most successful seasons to date.”
EF Pro cycling is yet to confirm who its next kit sponsor will be, and the team had not responded to BikeRadar’s request for comment at the time of publishing.
In keeping with their partnership, Rapha and EF Pro Cycling haven’t missed the opportunity to release a limited-edition kit collection to mark their parting of ways.
Available to Rapha RCC members from Thursday 9 October and to the general public from Friday 10 October, there will be three designs available.
The Crashed the Party kit uses the signature pink colour and is described as a fusion of the “best-loved” Rapha and EF Pro Cycling kit designs.
The Changed the Game jersey marks some of the team’s biggest victories, and the Back to Blackout design “closes the loop on the partnership, echoing the original blackout jersey worn by the first Rapha and EF Pro Cycling team in Australia, 2019”.
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With Halloween around the corner, let’s take a look at a spooky and supposedly true story going viral this week. Recently, a 911 call surfaced of a North Carolina man calling authorities because he thought he saw a bloody man by the side of a desolate country road. While he was speaking to the operator, something landed in the bed of his pickup truck, causing the 911 caller to start screaming “It’s not human! It’s not human!”
Check out the video:
My first reaction upon seeing this was the same as yours: It’s fake. Compelling, sure. but fake, like 100,000 other online “paranormal videos.” There’s no picture of the creature. We don’t know who the guy is. We don’t know the context. There’s no effort and no risk in making and posting a video online, so there’s no reason to think it’s real, so I swiped to the next video. But it turns out there’s enough evidence here that it at least deserves a deeper look.
Unlike the overwhelming majority of spooky videos posted online, a big part of this story is true. It’s a real recording of a 911 call placed at 11 p.m. on July 31, 2021 in Pender County, North Carolina. The verifiable details that the caller reported in the call are accurate too. Snopes listened to the entire 11-minute 911 call, and cross-checked the details to make sure the distance the caller said he’d driven check out, and they do.
The caller didn’t hang up, either. He waited around for Pender County Sheriff’s department officers to arrive, and he cooperated with the investigation. This means an actual person out there is willing to stand behind the story—that’s a much higher level of evidence than most paranormal claims online have. The cops didn’t find anything, but that was in keeping with the 911 call, too: Dude said he slammed on the brakes and the inhuman thing in his truck bed flew out, landed on the road, and took off into the woods.
“It’s some yahoo calling in a hoax report to 911,” you might be saying. Fair point, but that’s a crime, and the unnamed caller was apparently believable enough that he wasn’t arrested for filing a bogus police report. The sheriff took the incident seriously enough to open up a file about it, use state resources to look into it, and later do a media interview.
If the 911 caller had been reporting something else in this call, like a wounded deer in the highway or something, we wouldn’t question whether it actually happened. The recording and the police report would be overkill; we’d believe the guy just because he said it happened.
But I’m still 99.99% sure this guy either mistook something mundane for a monster or made up a tale entirely.
According to the 911 caller, the thing in the back of his pickup truck had shallow sunken eyes, and no nose, like someone had “taken skin and put it on a human skull and stretched it thin.” It was not human. As Carl Sagan once said, “extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence” and a mystery creature in South Carolina would certainly be extraordinary. If it was true, it would upend everything we know about biology, zoology, evolution, and North Carolina. I’m open to the possibility, but we need more than a 911 call to accept it. We’d need extraordinary evidence: video, photos, corroborating witnesses, and physical evidence wouldn’t even be enough. You’d have to catch one before it would make sense to rewrite the zoology textbooks.
Don’t lose hope, all you “I want to believe” people. It could still be real. Up until the mid-1800s, gorillas were basically Bigfoot, as far as Western science was concerned: A few people told tales of spotting them deep in the jungle, but there wasn’t a compelling reason to think they existed. Same with giant squids: Occasionally a sailor would swear he encountered one, but it wasn’t until the 1840s that there was physical evidence, and we didn’t have a photo of a giant squid until 2004.
Yeah, a previously undiscovered creature would have a harder time hiding out in modern North Carolina than gorillas had staying scarce in Cameroon in the 1840s, but it’s October, so I’m calling it a (barely, technically possible) mystery instead of an outright lie.
Qualcomm announced today that they are acquiring Arduino, the popular open-source hardware/electronics prototyping platform for single-board micro-controllers…
Discover the top 4 free and open source Ruby linter tools to enhance your coding standards and streamline your development process. Explore now!
The post 4 Best Free and Open Source Ruby Linter Tools appeared first on Linux Today.
Discover the latest DietPi 9.17 release featuring faster backups and early access to Roon Server. Upgrade your experience with enhanced performance today!
The post DietPi 9.17 Released with Faster Backups and Roon Server Early Access appeared first on Linux Today.
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Amazon Big Deal Days is coming October 7-8, and Lifehacker is sharing the best sales based on product reviews, comparisons, and price-tracking tools before it’s over.
Follow our live blog to stay up to date on the best sales we find.
Subscribe to our shopping newsletter, Add to Cart, for the best sales sent to your inbox.
New to Prime Day? We have a primer on everything you need to know. Sales are accurate at the time of publication, but prices and inventory are always subject to change.
Apple’s open-ear earbuds are a more comfortable alternative to the AirPods Pro, and they’re much cheaper, too. And now, with the AirPods 4, Apple has even introduced an Active Noise Cancellation option, as well as premium audio features once limited to the AirPods Pro.
Right now, you can get both versions of AirPods 4 at their lowest prices, matching the prices they reached during Amazon’s Prime Day sale in July 2025. The base AirPods 4 are discounted to $89.00 (down from $129) and the AirPods 4 with ANC are $119 (from $179).
The AirPods 4 feature shorter stems than their predecessors and a smaller case, but with the same open-ear iconic design. The tips now feature a better in-ear fit, without the need for the silicone tip found in the AirPods Pro.
The AirPods 4 feature the same H2 chip found in the premium AirPods Pro 2, bringing the same level of audio processing, and features like Voice Isolation, Conversation Awareness, and Personalized Spatial Audio with dynamic head tracking. The model with ANC gets a slightly less powerful version of noise cancellation, though (thanks to the absence of the silicone tips). AirPods 4 with ANC get Apple’s Transparency mode, which pumps in the sounds from the outside world, adjusting the intensity so it’s not too loud, while keeping you aware of your surroundings.
There’s USB-C charging in the case, and the AirPods 4 with ANC are also compatible with Qi and MagSafe charging, plus they have a built-in speaker for Find My tracking.
The AirPods 4 last for five hours on their own, and the case adds up to 30 hours of listening time. In ANC mode, they last for four hours. But a quick five-minute charge adds around one hour of listening time.
The AirPods 4 are a great choice for anyone looking for ANC on a budget, and for people who don’t like silicone ear tips. PCMag gave the AirPods 4 with Active Noise Cancellation four out of five stars, and an Editor’s Choice award. According to PCMag, “The AirPods 4 are capable of what no other open earbuds have yet to attempt: high-quality active noise cancellation. They also deliver excellent audio performance.”
And if you don’t want the ANC, you can save even more. The base AirPods 4 at $90 are one of the best deals in tech.
Looking for something else? Retailers like Walmart and Best Buy have Prime Day competition sales that are especially useful if you don’t have Amazon Prime.
Walmart’s Prime Day competition sale runs from Oct. 6 at 7 p.m. ET through Oct. 12 and includes deals up to 50% off. It’s an especially good option if you have Walmart+.
Best Buy’s Prime Day competition sale runs from Sept. 27 through Oct. 12, and has some of the best tech sales online. It’s an especially good option if you’re a My Best Buy “Plus” or “Total” member.
Target’s Prime Day competition sale runs from Oct. 5 through Oct. 11, and it has deals going up to 50% off. You can become a Circle member for free.
One
Being worked on for the past roughly three years has been Linear Address Space Separation “LASS” for the Linux kernel as a security improvement in light of Spectre/Meltdown…
The unfortunate reality of living in a world that’s largely abandoned headphone jacks is that you have to own a pair of wireless earbuds to listen to things on your phone. Accepting that, you might as well own a good pair of earbuds, and if you’re on Android, Google’s wireless earbuds are one of your best options. You can purchase a pair of Google’s Pixel Buds Pro 2 for $170 for Prime Day, $60 less than its normal $230 price. That’s a pretty great deal for a pair of wireless earbuds that rival Apple’s AirPods Pro 3.
The Pixel Buds Pro 2 are compact wireless earbuds with a touch-sensitive surface and a small circular ring in the back to help them stay in your ears. You can currently purchase the buds in bluish-gray “Moonstone,” off-white “Porcelain,” pink “Peony” or light black “Hazel” color options, but whichever you choose, you’ll get solid active noise cancellation and a collection of other helpful audio features. In terms of ANC, Engadget’s review of the Pixel Buds Pro 2 found that the earbuds do a good job of blocking out “low-to-mid-range noise” but still struggle to block out nearby voices. On the whole, though, the Pixel Buds Pro 2 sounds better than Google’s previous wireless earbuds, particularly when you’re listening bass-forward tracks.
The capabilities of the Pixel Buds Pro 2 extend beyond just listening to music, of course. Like its competitors, Google has turned its wireless earbuds into hearing protection, too. The Pixel Buds Pro 2 were recently updated to support what Google calls Loud Noise Protection, which can reduce incoming loud noises to protect your ears. That’s on top of features like Adaptive Audio, which can adjust noise cancellation and volume based on your surroundings, and Talk to Gemini Live, which gives you a hands-free way to have a free-flowing conversation with Google’s AI chatbot.
There might be other earbuds that offer better audio performance, but the Pixel Buds Pro 2 is the best option if you’re on Android and want a seamless experience. For $170 during Prime Day, that’s hard to pass up.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/googles-pixel-buds-pro-2-are-cheaper-than-ever-for-prime-day-130038433.html?src=rss
Greetings, Arsians! Welcome to the second Prime Day of 2025, because apparently we didn’t buy enough stuff last time and Amazon still has things to sell. Our e-commerce gnomes have scoured the retail giant’s listings from top to bottom for the best deals, and now we’re bringing those deals to you! We’ll be updating the list below throughout the day on October 7 and October 8 as this two-day retail extravaganza progresses, so if you don’t see something you like at the moment, check back again later and perhaps something will tickle your fancy then. Happy shopping!
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Hill: A Senate report released (PDF) Monday says AI and automation could replace nearly 100 million jobs across various industries over the next decade. The report, conducted by Democratic staffers on the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee, led by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), outlines how AI and automation will impact the American economy and workforce. Sanders, the ranking member on the HELP Committee, has warned of the consequences widespread use of AI and automation can have for workers.
As part of their investigation, staffers asked ChatGPT, OpenAI’s chatbot, to predict the impact of AI and automation on certain industries. Of the 20 workforces ChatGPT said would be most affected by the technological rush, 15 will see more than half of their workforces replaced by AI and automation over the next decade. The workforce most impacted will be fast food and counter employees. According to the report, more than 3 million fast food and counter workers will be replaced over the next 10 years, accounting for 89 percent of the workforce.
Other workforces that will be significantly affected include customer service representatives, laborers and freight, stock and material movers and secretaries and executive assistants — not including legal, medical and executive positions. The report said that 83 percent, 81 percent and 80 percent of those workforces, respectively, will be replaced in the next decade. […] Sanders, in a Fox News op-ed published Monday, doubled down on the report’s findings, saying increased technological capacity risks “dehumanizing” individuals. “We do not simply need a more ‘efficient’ society,” Sanders said. “We need a world where people live healthier, happier and more fulfilling lives.”
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication.
Amazon Big Deal Days is on October 7-8, and Lifehacker is sharing the best sales based on product reviews, comparisons, and price-tracking tools.
Follow our live blog to stay up to date on the best sales we find.
Subscribe to our shopping newsletter, Add to Cart, for the best sales sent to your inbox.
New to Prime Day? We have a primer on everything you need to know. Sales are accurate at the time of publication, but prices and inventory are always subject to change.
If you’re hoping to catch the future early, you should check out these XReal One AR smart glasses. They’re on sale for $449, down from $569.00. This is the lowest price they’ve ever been on sale on Amazon.
If you’re not familiar: XReal Ones are augmented-reality display glasses. They’re compatible with any device with USB-C video, and when you slip ’em on, it’s like looking at bright, clear 147″ high-def monitor. Plus, the built-in G1 chip gives you 3DOF augmented reality, so you can anchor your virtual screen into real space.
I have a pair of the XReal One Pro version of these glasses, and I highly recommend them, whether you want to have a second screen for productivity, play games in a new way, or just have the best entertainment experience possible on an airplane. I recently spent a day with them on, using them to replace every screen I look at, and it was like living in a science fiction movie.
XReal has also lowered the price of its Beam Pro device by 20%. This optional “spacial computing companion” powers XReal glasses, adds a 3D camera, gives you enhanced controls, and improves the augmented reality experience.
Looking for something else? Retailers like Walmart and Best Buy have Prime Day competition sales that are especially useful if you don’t have Amazon Prime.
Walmart’s Prime Day competition sale runs from Oct. 6 at 7 p.m. ET through Oct. 12 and includes deals up to 50% off. It’s an especially good option if you have Walmart+.
Best Buy’s Prime Day competition sale runs from Sept. 27 through Oct. 12, and has some of the best tech sales online. It’s an especially good option if you’re a My Best Buy “Plus” or “Total” member.
Target’s Prime Day competition sale runs from Oct. 5 through Oct. 11, and it has deals going up to 50% off. You can become a Circle member for free.
We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication.
Amazon Big Deal Days is coming October 7-8, and Lifehacker is sharing the best sales based on product reviews, comparisons, and price-tracking tools before it’s over.
Subscribe to our shopping newsletter, Add to Cart, for the best sales sent to your inbox.
New to Prime Day? We have a primer on everything you need to know. Sales are accurate at the time of publication, but prices and inventory are always subject to change.
If you’re looking for a smart alarm clock that will help you gently ease into the day (and wind down at night), the 2024 Amazon Echo Spot is currently 44% off for Prime Day, marking its lowest price ever, according to price-trackers. An update to the original Echo Spot, the new version is available in three colors and is built around Amazon’s Alexa voice assistant. It also doubles as a speaker, integrating well with the rest of an Alexa-compatible smart home.
As this PCMag review notes, it resembles the Echo Pop in shape (also on sale) but is slightly larger, featuring a speaker grille on the bottom and a vivid color touch screen. It has dual-band wifi and Bluetooth, and can be easily set up via the Alexa app. While it stays visible from a few feet away regardless of the lighting in the room you’re in, visibility drops if it’s viewed from an off-angle, and the resolution of 320 by 240 pixels doesn’t make it a first choice for visual communication and content, especially since it doesn’t have a camera or support video playback—though for those with privacy concerns, no camera is a perk.
However, it does show more information than the Echo Dot with Clock and has basic touch controls, allowing you to easily see the time and weather, check what music is playing, and adjust other smart devices in your home. According to the PCMag review, the speaker itself offers “decent audio with little bass” for its size, making it suitable for everyday listening, but is not a full-fledged speaker.
If you don’t mind the information on the display screen being somewhat limited and want a touch alarm clock that offers basic smart home controls, responds reliably to Alexa, and offers good sound quality for its size, the 2024 Amazon Echo Spot is a modern version of a clock radio that doesn’t try to do too much. However, if you want a full smart display experience or more powerful audio, this may not be ideal. Still, at $45, this bedside companion checks a lot of boxes.
Looking for something else? Retailers like Walmart and Best Buy have Prime Day competition sales that are especially useful if you don’t have Amazon Prime.
Walmart’s Prime Day competition sale runs from Oct. 6 at 7 p.m. ET through Oct. 12 and includes deals up to 50% off. It’s an especially good option if you have Walmart+.
Best Buy’s Prime Day competition sale runs from Sept. 27 through Oct. 12, and has some of the best tech sales online. It’s an especially good option if you’re a My Best Buy “Plus” or “Total” member.
Target’s Prime Day competition sale runs from Oct. 5 through Oct. 11, and it has deals going up to 50% off. You can become a Circle member for free.
The battle for overall wireless headphone supremacy is fiercely contested every year, but when it comes to banishing undesirable noise, Bose usually comes out on top. That was certainly the case when we pitted 2025’s contenders for your cash against each other, and Bose’s QuietComfort Ultra took away the title of best noise-canceling headphones. And right now, the very same headphones are $100 off for Prime Day at $329.
Note that this deal applies to the previous generation QuietComfort Ultra, rather than the refreshed second-gen model Bose has just announced. These offer improved battery life, ANC and audio performance, and they also support lossless audio over a wired USB-C connection for the first time. However, these headphones also cost $449 out of the gate, which is considerably more than the heavily slashed price of their predecessor.
If you don’t have to have the latest and greatest in every product line, the first-gen QuietComfort Ultra will be more than enough for the vast majority of people. They still offer exceptional noise-canceling, very good sound and a comfortable design. Bose’s “Immersive Audio” spatial sound feature can be a bit hit and miss, but with the right content it can be incredible. And while $329 is still a lot of money, $100 is a big saving on what were very recently the best Bose headphones you can buy.
Click here for our rolling coverage of the best Prime Day 2025 deals, which we’ll be updating as the event rolls on.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/the-bose-quietcomfort-ultra-headphones-are-100-off-for-prime-day-123043790.html?src=rss
Google has failed to convince the Supreme Court to block the injunction requiring the company to make major changes to the Play Store after it lost its case with Epic Games. The Verge and Reuters have reported that the Supreme Court has denied the company’s request for a partial stay on the injunction while it prepares to appeal. In a tweet, Epic CEO Tim Sweeney said that developers “will be legally entitled to steer US Google Play users to out-of-app payments without fees, scare screens and friction” starting on October 22.
The Supreme Court has thrown out Google’s stay request. Starting October 22, developers will be legally entitled to steer US Google Play users to out-of-app payments without fees, scare screens, and friction – same as Apple App Store users in the US! https://t.co/yO1g1NqXt3 pic.twitter.com/S64YvQLyYM
— Tim Sweeney (@TimSweeneyEpic) October 6, 2025
If you’ll recall, Epic accused Google of having an illegal monopoly on app distribution and in-app billing services for Android devices in its lawsuit. A federal jury sided with Epic Games in December 2023 and concluded that it had been negatively affected by Google’s policies. Google tried to get the court’s decision overturned, but the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals decided to uphold the court’s original ruling in July this year. The company intends to file an appeal to the Supreme Court on October 27 and had petitioned it for a partial stay of the permanent injunction.
Since the Supreme Court didn’t grant Google’s request, it now has to allow developers to use payment methods other than its own billing system without fees by the end of the month. The company has to allow developers to steer their customers to those payment systems and to link to ways on how to download their apps outside the Play Store. Google can no longer strike deals with carriers or manufacturers to ensure Google Play exclusivity and the preinstallation of the app store either. By July 2026, the company has to allow users to download other app stores within Google Play and to make Play’s catalog available to its competitors, as well.
“Android provides more choice for users and developers than any mobile OS, and the changes ordered by the US District Court will jeopardize users’ ability to safely download apps,” Google spokesperson Dan Jackson told The Verge. “While we’re disappointed the order isn’t stayed, we will continue our appeal.”
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/supreme-court-denies-googles-request-to-pause-play-store-changes-while-it-appeals-epic-case-121502132.html?src=rss
I take a swig of beer as my eyes adapt to the darkness. My ears are still adjusting to the pounding four-to-the-floor beats pulsing from the speakers.
Had I spawned here without any prior knowledge, I’d wager I was at a DIY electronic-music festival or some sort of illicit cycling-themed hilltop rave – I certainly wouldn’t guess I was at a Wednesday evening club ride.
But Basso, as I’m about to find out over the next few days, takes great pride in doing things differently.
We’re at the summit of a short, steep stretch of road just above Bassano del Grappa, Italy, waiting for the weekly ‘Carbo Ride’ peloton to complete a timed mid-course hill climb.
Basso flags flutter in the evening breeze. To my left, marketing and product manager Leonardo Basso leans against his Instagrammable company-branded Land Rover Defender, squinting into the night.
“Here they come!” he exclaims as the first riders rip through the darkness in a blur of red and white light.
Participants congregate at the top – many straddling Basso bikes – chatting and comparing segment times.
After this, it’s just a short cruise back into town for the hard-earned pay-off: refreshments and free pasta at Basso’s bustling community hub, Bassano Club House. It’s a fitting introduction, both to the brand and the town that fostered it.
Basso was born in Bassano almost 50 years ago, but unlike most brands, which outsource production to Asia as they grow bigger, Basso has doubled down on keeping operations local.
After a short but restful night’s sleep in one of the Club House’s five rooms (the Italians don’t do early nights), I meet CEO Alessandro Basso to find out more.
As we drive the 10 minutes to the brand’s HQ, he talks me through the local riding in detail.
“There are lots of routes that go to Venice, to the seaside, to the beach,” he explains as we speed through emerald-green Italian countryside. “But Bassano is really the gateway to the mountains. When you go north, you have Monte Grappa and Asiago. Behind that, you can ride the Alps. Left and right, it’s all the wine country – smaller hills, rolling terrain. I mean, you don’t want a two-hour climb every day, do you?”
Crucially, Bassano and the surrounding areas have a bit of everything.
MTB trails, gravel tracks, iconic Giro d’Italia climbs – this makes it the ideal setting for a local brand developing and testing new bikes.
“There’s a big variety,” Alessandro agrees. “From a brand perspective, you can do everything from your doorstep when it comes to testing. There’s one particular MTB loop we use for this purpose. It’s a minute away from the office.”
For Alessandro, building in Bassano is less about the perceived prestige of the ‘Made in Italy’ label and more about quality assurance.
“Made in Italy is important,” he explains. “But the most important thing is that we manage the whole supply chain of our bicycles. This way, we know exactly who put their hands on each and every product.
“We know what time of the day it was, what the temperature was like, even the level of humidity. We know everything. This gives us complete control over the quality of every single bike we make, no matter what.”
We pull up outside Basso’s head office and step inside. The brand already does everything locally, including carbon-fibre manufacture and painting. But the ultimate goal is to have everything housed under one roof.
To achieve this, Alessandro is in the process of expanding the facility I’m standing in right now.
There’s already a brand-new warehouse, where bikes are assembled on the production line before being carefully boxed up to be shipped all over the world.
“This one’s going to Canada,” Alessandro tells me, inspecting the shipping notes of one package. “And these are going to one of our distributors in Germany,” he says, scanning another.
“Each frame produced here is assigned a unique code,” Alessandro explains. “This allows it to be tracked through every stage of the production and pre-assembly process. It means we have complete traceability from start to finish.”
Past the towering stacks of boxes and rows of mechanics tinkering away lies a cavernous expanse of empty space. This, Alessandro tells me, will soon be home to Basso’s in-house carbon-fibre production unit, testing facility and paint room. “Like I said,” he reiterates, “the entire process from start to finish.”
To understand the Basso brothers’ vision for the future of the brand, it first helps to understand their father and company founder, Alcide Basso.
When he founded the brand in 1977, it was just him – a teenager in a garage with some tubes and a few tools. But even then, the focus on quality and attention to detail was there.
I meet Alcide in the Bassano Club House. Like me, he’s fresh from Basso HQ, where he can still be found on an almost daily basis.
When he’s not consulting on matters regarding the business, you might even catch him in the workshop, where he still builds the occasional Basso Viper frame – the only classic steel bicycle left in the company’s range.
I’ve spent the afternoon carefully preparing a set of questions for Alcide, but within seconds of him pulling up a chair and ordering a drink, it becomes apparent that this is going to be more of a strap-in-for-the-ride type of interview.
“This is the bible!” Alcide proclaims as he proudly flicks through a carefully preserved copy of the first-ever Basso catalogue.
He stops at a page filled with complex diagrams detailing his own personal research into how different tube thicknesses react to varying levels of heat.
“I wasn’t an engineer. I learned by making mistakes. I studied the materials, the welding, the microstructure. I had to understand what happened when you changed the thickness or temperature. That was the foundation of Basso – that’s what set us apart from the other Italian brands.”
Bicycles are in Alcide’s blood. His brother, Marino, was a world champion road racer, and he remembers growing up surrounded by cycling paraphernalia.
“I liked working with the mechanical side of things, so when I was 18, I began welding frames.”
Business was slow at first, but Alcide remembers the sale that started it all in 1978 – Harry Hall Cycles in Manchester.
Alcide met the man himself at Milano Bike Show, and before he knew what was happening, Hall had taken it upon himself to visit Alcide’s garage in Bassano and watch a Basso frame being built. A week later, Alcide received an order for 35 bicycles.
“It’s just me! I can’t possibly make that many bicycles! But he told me he would wait for them, and he did.”
That order helped take Basso to the next level, but it was when Alcide travelled to Germany to visit his other brother at university that things really kicked off.
He knew there were plenty of high-end automotive marques headquartered nearby in Stuttgart. If German consumers appreciated a well-engineered car, perhaps they would also value a well-engineered bicycle.
So, Alcide embarked on a full-blown German sales mission armed with his catalogue and a frame, determined to speak with anyone and everyone who might be interested.
Eventually, it paid off when two colossal German sporting goods suppliers, Brügelmann and Stier, took an interest.
“We expanded operations, and after eight years, we were selling 5,000 frames a year in the UK and Germany alone,” Alcide says.
No matter how big Basso gets, Alcide’s core values remain central. “Basso is a unique company,” he says. “Almost 50 years as a family business. Many other Italian companies have stopped or been sold to investors – we are still here.
“Now it is the second generation – my sons and my daughter – but the most important thing we transfer is attention to detail. Growth is one thing, but controlling quality alongside it is harder. We don’t just want to make more, more, more. We want to make better. That is why we control every detail ourselves.”
Basso has evolved with the times, without losing sight of its founding principles. The same is true of its bikes.
The brand’s latest creation, the SV, is a prime example, fusing cutting-edge technology with a methodical approach to geometry, speed and comfort.
After wrapping up with Alcide in the Club House, I’ve got about five minutes to throw some kit on and take one out for an evening spin with his other son, Leonardo.
As we cruise out of Bassano and into the rolling hills to the west, Leonardo gives me the lowdown on the bike I’m riding.
“With high-end road bikes, you usually had two options – a bike designed for the pros, or an all-road bike,” he explains. “The middle ground wasn’t really developed. That’s where the SV comes in.
“We tried to understand who is buying these very expensive pro-level bikes. Naturally, most are not professional racers. So, the focus with Sempre Veloce was simple – you can’t ride fast if you’re not comfortable on the bike. We call the concept ‘performance comfort.’”
This is the first Basso road bike with a significantly sloping top tube.
The stack is higher, the reach a little shorter, the tyre clearance a generous 35mm, and the wheelbase slightly longer, which gives more stability without losing responsiveness.
As someone who rides a slammed road bike at home, my spine is grateful for the more practical geometry, but aesthetically, it still looks like a real race weapon.
Angular lines, raw-carbon finish, narrow bars – proof that ‘comfortable’ isn’t always a synonym for ‘boring’.
As we coast back into town, I can see the famous Bassano del Grappa nightlife beginning to bloom. Under the warm glow of streetlights, Bassano Club House and its neighbouring bars are all bustling with activity. We grab the two remaining seats outside and order ourselves a well-earned beer.
We’re not the only people who’ve popped in for a post-ride pint. The tables out front are occupied in equal parts by casual diners and sweat-streaked cyclists, helmet straps dangling freely. Inside, cleats clatter across tiled floors, and various Basso bikes hang resplendent on the walls.
“People can come, they can stay here, they can hire a bike,” Leonardo says. “We also have a workshop, a kitchen and a retail space too.”
It’s a living extension of the Basso brand and a place for Bassano’s cycling community to come together.
From Alcide’s garage in 1977 to the bustling Bassano Club House today, Basso has always been about more than bicycles.
The frames may be lighter, faster and more advanced, but the spirit is unchanged: a family business rooted in its hometown, fuelled by community, and driven forward by the firm belief that the best bikes are built close to home.
At its typical $499, the Google Pixel 9a is Engadget’s pick for the best mid-range phone. But when it’s $150 off, you’ll be hard-pressed to find a better deal on any piece of tech. Right now, you can get Google’s budget-friendly phone for a record-low $349 thanks to Amazon Prime Day.
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This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/prime-day-deals-include-the-google-pixel-9a-for-a-new-record-low-120044455.html?src=rss
