The guy who opens up the things you ride.
Alex Rahman has been repairing e-scooters and e-bikes in Dubai since the category barely existed here. What started as a side project — fixing a Xiaomi for a neighbour in 2019 — became a small workshop in Al Quoz, which became the basis for every hands-on review you’ll find on IonicRide.
Every review on this site, every “workshop verdict” box, every ranked list — they come from Alex and the team at the bench. Not from reading specs. Not from watching YouTube. From actually opening these machines up, seeing what fails, and having the same conversations with the same frustrated customers hundreds of times.
You can tell a lot about a scooter by the customer who brings it in. And even more by what they bring it in for.
— Alex, on why repair data beats spec sheetsHow a mechanical engineer ended up fixing scooters in Al Quoz
Alex trained as a mechanical engineer before moving to Dubai in 2019. The plan was a corporate engineering job. The reality was weekends spent fixing friends’ scooters because nobody else knew how — and realising there was a gap in the market big enough to walk through.
Relocated to the UAE for an engineering role. Fixed a neighbour’s Xiaomi Pro 2 as a favour. Got asked to fix three more the same week.
Ran a home-based repair service through WhatsApp referrals during the pandemic — when shops were closed and everyone suddenly needed personal transport that wasn’t a taxi.
Took over a corner of an auto shop in Al Quoz Industrial 3. Started stocking genuine Xiaomi and Segway spare parts. Formal trade licence sorted through a local partner.
After a brutal summer of BMS failures and battery swelling complaints, Alex started publishing notes on what actually survives Dubai summers — and what doesn’t. These notes became the first articles on IonicRide.
Built the publication to answer the questions customers kept asking: Is this scooter legal here? Will it survive the heat? Is this repair worth it? Began publishing systematically.
IonicRide now publishes ~100 guides, reviews and troubleshooting articles. Alex leads the testing bench and writes the workshop verdicts on every major review.
What actually happens at the bench
The workshop handles roughly 10 to 15 machines a week — some for full rebuilds, some for diagnostics, some that end up on the scrap pile. Every model that comes through gets logged. Same failure patterns across dozens of units tell us more about a scooter’s reliability than any lab could.
The bench has seen every major brand sold in the UAE. Xiaomi is the most common by volume. Segway shows up less but tends to come in with electrical faults rather than mechanical ones. Kaabo and Dualtron are rarer and harder to source parts for — which gets reflected in every “parts availability” score on this site.
When a customer asks “should I repair this or replace it?” — that question, asked hundreds of times, is where our troubleshooting hub and repair cost guides came from. The answers weren’t hypothetical. They were written down after telling someone for the fiftieth time that yes, a new battery costs nearly as much as the scooter.
The four questions every review starts with
Spec sheets are fiction until proven otherwise. The questions that actually matter to a Dubai rider are rarely the ones manufacturers lead with. Every review Alex writes runs through the same filter:
Does the heat break it?
45°C ambient is the real Dubai test. BMS cut-offs, throttle lag, battery swelling — we see them all, and we note which brands handle it.
Can we fix it here?
A scooter nobody in the UAE can source parts for is a future doorstop. This gets weighed heavily.
Does the range claim hold up?
Almost all range claims are off by 20–40% in Dubai conditions. We flag the ones that lie hardest.
Is it legal for the buyer?
A 60 km/h scooter needs a motorcycle licence in the UAE. We say it clearly, every time, even when it hurts the affiliate click-through.
“If it’s been on my bench three times for the same fault — that goes in the review, full stop.”
Reliability isn’t what a brand’s press release says. It’s what the same brand’s scooter keeps coming back for. That’s the data nobody else in this market has. It’s the whole point of the site.
The questions Alex gets asked most
How Dubai conditions destroy a test rig
Most review sites run standardised indoor tests — consistent temperature, flat ground, new tyres. Useful for comparisons. Useless for Dubai reality. A scooter that tests brilliantly at 22°C in a European lab might throttle itself to 18 km/h at 1pm in Al Qusais in August.
Our testing isn’t a lab — it’s a bench, a thermal gun, a set of standardised Dubai routes (SZR service road, Al Quoz to Downtown via JLT, a full Jumeirah loop), and enough repaired units of each model to compare long-term wear patterns. We’re not pretending to be Consumer Reports. We’re doing what a workshop can actually do, and being honest about it.
For the full methodology, read our Editorial Policy. For what it costs us not to take sponsored ranking deals, read our Affiliate Disclosure.
Recent articles by Alex
- Review Best Electric Scooters in Dubai 2026: Top 10 Tested & Ranked Jan 2026
- Review Xiaomi 4 Ultra: Real Tests After 3 Months in Dubai Heat Feb 2026
- Review Segway Ninebot MAX G2: Is It Worth AED 4,000 in Dubai? Feb 2026
- Fix Battery Not Charging? 12 Reasons + Fixes for Dubai Heat Feb 2026
- Laws Are E-Scooters Legal in Dubai? Complete 2026 Guide Jan 2026
- Guide E-Scooter Price Dubai: Budget to Premium Guide 2026 Jan 2026
- Fix E-Scooter Repair Dubai 2026: 20 Shops With Prices, Reviews & Wait Times Feb 2026
- Review Best Delivery E-Bikes Dubai 2026: Range + ROI Break-Even Feb 2026
Reach out
Corrections, repair questions, review requests, disagreements with a ranking — all welcome. Alex reads every message that comes through the contact form, usually within 48 hours. Press, brand enquiries and sponsorship proposals go to the same address and get the same reply speed.
Email Alex and the team
Questions about a scooter, a review, or the site itself.