Winners announced for Alterlock anti-theft GPS units worth £114.99. each

The Alterlock anti-theft GPS unit competition is now closed, and we can announce our winners!

John Kane
Lisa Buckley
John Higham
Wendy Moncaster
Karen Bicknell

Alterlock will be in contact with each of you shortly. For everybody else who entered, thank you and better luck next time! 

This week's competition is brought to you from Alterlock, an award-winning Japanese tech company looking to bring you peace of mind when you're on a mid-ride coffee stop, or have to leave your bike unattended for any length of time. 

Alterlock's design is a slim, lightweight anti-theft alarm and GPS tracking system unit that attaches to your bike via the water bottle cage mounts. It's designed to disappear into the overall aesthetic of your bike and sit hidden under your bottle cage. It’s not designed to physically prevent theft, but is there to reduce your anxiety that your lock might be cut when you walk away and you'll lose your bike forever. With Alterlock fitted and alarmed, if this occurs you will be able to track the location of your bike.

Alterlock have five units to give away to five road.cc readers, and each one is worth £115. All of them will be supplied with a month's free trial to play with the system and see how it works, which can then be extended as you wish. 

The new Alterlock is officially being launched in Europe in Spring 2021, after a successful launch of the first version in Japan in late 2018. Japan is a country which is universally accepted to have very low crime levels, but Alterlock claim the Japanese do have issues with umbrella, bicycle and bizarrely, saddle thefts... 5800 of them by one man! 

Back in February, Anna wrote an introduction to Alterlock and how it works (you can read the full article here). Suffice to say it packs some very clever stuff inside that slim design. As the Alterlock product/service has not been launched in Europe yet, we're looking forward to testing how it works when we receive our test unit... cue some epic bike 'thefts' and tracking reviews! 

You can check out Alterlock's website for the full rundown of how it does what it does, but here’s a brief summary of how it works: 

1) Your phone is your lock key, and locks/unlocks your bike before you ride it.

2) Once locked it will sound a warning alarm if someone knocks into your bike, or perhaps gives it a tug to see how well it is locked up (with a traditional lock). The level of shaking can be tuned to detect the finest movement if left in a secure place, like your lockup. Alterlock have developed their own vibration detection algorithm to avoid false alarms, and set a quieter tone for small movements that might occur in the work cycle rack or outside the coffee shop.

3) If your bike is moved, i.e. stolen, an alarm will sound and your phone will receive live tracking information via its GPS module and Sigfox communication system which, unlike just Bluetooth, does not require you to be ‘in range’ of the unit.

4) The new 2nd generation model also latches onto Wi-Fi signals, so can help pinpoint your bike's location even if there is nothing to see.

5) The device can be fitted with anti-theft bolts to prevent it being quickly removed with a common hex key.

Like a lot of similar products in the motorbike and car tracker world, there is a subscription to a bicycle guard service which costs £3.49 monthly or £34.99 for the year. The competition prize is 1-month free connection so you can have a play and see if you want to continue. It all sounds very cool and high tech, and we cannot wait to test it! 

Please note that this competition is only open to the following European countries: Belgium, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain, Netherlands, United Kingdom, and Finland.

All you have to do in order to be in with a chance to win one of five units is to head on down below and fill out the entry form.

The entry form is below. Can't see it? Click here!