In the latest in a series of acquisitions, SRAM today announced the purchase of Velocio Apparel, a cycling apparel brand from New England, USA.

With this move, Velocio joins recently acquired Hammerhead and Time, along with established brands Rockshox, Quarq, Truvativ, and Zipp, under the Chicago-based SRAM LLC group.

In a statement released by Bellocchio, the move was initially instigated by Bellocchio himself, rather than the other way around.

"There is a unique challenge in running a business that is often overlooked. If you succeed, the reward is a deepened expectation of growth." Grow too big, too fast, and the risk is the often lamented loss of brand, dilution of product, and corner-cutting changes to increase profits.

To avoid being forced to do this, the brand decided that the solution was to sell Velocio to a larger brand or group, with which it has collaborated many times since the two brands co-sponsored the Velocio-SRAM women's team in 2015 approached SRAM.

While Velocio will undoubtedly get the scalability it seeks, today's announcement points out that Velocio's method of operation will remain largely unchanged.

"Our supply chain, manufacturing, and product design will not be incorporated into SRAM's manufacturing arm; all of Velocio's policies and campaigns that have defined our brand, from the Signature Guarantee to the Unity Campaign, will not change. They will remain the same. And our customer service team, which has always satisfied our customers, will continue to do so as well."

When Velocio was launched in 2013, its three cornerstones were to create "better cycling products, a better cycling culture, and a deeper commitment to responsible manufacturing," but according to today's release, these core values also appear to remain unfiltered.

"We will now be backed by SRAM, more independent product design and development, and a further push toward sustainability in our product offerings and how we deliver them.

Today's announcement marks SRAM's first foray into clothing and apparel as a company. To many, this will be a surprise acquisition that does not appear to be directly aligned with the direction of the business. For example, the acquisition of Time Pedals appears to have been tactical, as SRAM could re-establish the Time brand as a competitor to Shimano and Look by providing hardware manufacturing expertise, while adding Quark and Powertap's knowledge of power meters This would create a strong competitor to Garmin Rally and Wahoo Powerlink Zero. The same could be said for the Hammerhead acquisition: the opportunity for direct integration with SRAM's AXS groupset would be a unique selling point that no other brand could match.

It remains to be seen in what direction SRAM can take the Velocio brand, or whether this is just another string in SRAM's ever-growing bow.