Trekstor is a German consumer electronics company. In addition to notebooks, tablets, USB sticks, external hard drives, MP3 players, e-book readers and other products, the product range also includes road-legal e-scooters since 2019.
History
The company was founded in 2001 as Trekstor GmbH & Co. KG by Daniel Szmigiel in Lorsch, Hesse, a small town between Mannheim and Frankfurt am Main. Initially focusing on USB sticks, MP3 players and external hard drives were added to the product range in 2003. In 2015, the company relocated to neighboring Bensheim.
Among other things, sales, parts of production, development and quality management are located in Bensheim, while the majority of manufacturing takes place in Asia. After the company was founded, the number of employees increased rapidly, and in 2005 total sales amounted to 145 million euros. In 2007, sales still amounted to more than 135 million euros.
After two less successful years, the company filed for insolvency on July 21, 2009. After a bankruptcy loan and the entry of Telefield International (Holding) Limited, Trekstor GmbH was newly founded at the beginning of November 2009, which took over the employees, inventory and property rights of the former Trekstor GmbH & Co. KG were taken over.
At the end of 2010, the company introduced an e-book reader and several products from the mobile communications sector. For example, a transportable UMTS WLAN hotspot and two Android-based smartphones were presented in cooperation with the Chinese group Huawei.
Since 2012, the Trekstor Liro Ink, an e-book reader with electronic ink, has been marketed via the Börsenverein des Deutschen Buchhandels. Tablet computers are now also part of the company’s portfolio.
First introduced in the fall of 2013, Trekstor has been offering the third-generation Volks tablet in cooperation with Bild.de since mid-November 2014. While the first two models (fall 2013: Trekstor Volks-Tablet, spring 2014: Trekstor SurfTab xiron 10.1 3G / Volks-Tablet with 3G) were equipped with an Android operating system, Trekstor is presenting the SurfTab wintron 10.1 and the variant for mobile Internet, the SurfTab wintron 10.1 3G, for the first time a Volks-Tablet with the Windows 8.1 operating system with Bing, which can also be expanded to include a keyboard.
According to its own information in the 2016 financial statements, Trekstor is the manufacturer of the Porsche Design Book One from 2017.
Since 2019, Trekstor is again fully owned by the Szmigiel family, and since fall 2019, it has also been active as a vehicle manufacturer for street-legal e-scooters.
Funfact
In August 2007, Trekstor caused a stir with an unfortunate naming move: A black MP3 player from the i.Beat line was announced in a press release as i.Beat blaxx, which is pronounced like “I beat blacks.” After a negative posting on Gizmodo, the player was renamed Trekstor blaxx a day later.