Our History: The Making of Factor

From racing bikes to making the fastest bikes in modern cycling.

Where it Begins

Factor’s story begins with Rob Gitelis. A WorldTour pro in the 1990s and a chemical-engineering graduate from the University of Miami, Rob travelled to Taiwan in 1996 and stepped into the world of bicycle manufacturing. What he found there wasn’t just a factory floor, it was a frontier. He applied his racing instincts to engineering problems few others were thinking about, pioneering early applications of carbon fibre in performance bike construction. Within a few years he had become the quiet force behind some of the most respected brands in the sport, the “outsider with insider knowledge” who knew how to build bikes that went beyond what was considered possible.

Pioneering Carbon: Rob’s Era of Innovation

Rob’s approach to design and manufacturing was bold, fearless, and uncompromising. He combined deep technical craft with a racer’s understanding of feel, speed, and purpose, a rare pairing in the industry. But he was still building other people’s bikes. He wanted to break the status quo, not serve it. He wanted to create bikes that only he could create.

BF1 Systems and the Birth of Factor

That opportunity arrived in 2013. BF1 Systems, a Norfolk-based motorsport engineering company working at the pinnacle of Formula performance, had developed a concept bike called the Factor Vis Vires. A skunkworks experiment, it won multiple design awards, but BF1 wanted a visionary to turn it into a true brand. They approached Rob, already one of the most sought-after names in carbon engineering. During the 2016 Tour Down Under, the deal was finalised. Factor, in its modern form, was born.

The Fastest Rise in WorldTour History

What happened next was unprecedented. Within nine months, before producing even 250 bikes, Rob signed AG2R to ride Factor in the WorldTour. Less than a year later, Factor bikes were on the start line of the 2017 Tour de France, the fastest rise to the top tier of the sport in modern cycling. The team raced a then-unreleased Factor O2, and Romain Bardet rode it to a stage win and a podium in the general classification. The industry had never seen anything like it. Many assumed Factor was a one-year-old brand; those who knew better understood its roots stretched back to Rob’s arrival in Taiwan in 1996.

A New Era: Froome, Records & Breakthroughs

From that moment, racing became the core of Factor’s identity. Factor bikes have since won some of the world’s biggest races, broken world records, and driven innovation across road, gravel, track, and MTB. In 2021, seven-time Grand Tour winner and four-time Tour de France champion Chris Froome joined Rob as an investor and co-owner, bringing his unparalleled racing insights into Factor’s engineering process.

The Legacy We Build Every Day

In 2024, eight years after Rob founded the company, Factor launched the OSTRO VAM at the Tour Down Under, independently tested and proven to be the world’s fastest road bike. It was raced for the first time and immediately ridden to victory by Stevie Williams.

From 1996 to today, one principle has guided everything we do: Never Status Quo. Factor doesn’t follow the industry. Factor pushes it forward.