I first mentioned Evan Solida’s Cerevellum concept at the end of 2007 and I had a chance to ride with a rough prototype a few months later. At that time, Evan’s cylco-computer with an integrated digital rearview camera was just a concept design, but now the product is starting production and is available for pre-order on the Cerevellum website. The Cerevellum will be manufactured in North America and ready to ship in Spring 2011. The cost is $499 ($549 with heart-rate strap) and pre-orders are refundable.

Evan, who was a 2004 Kansas state champion cyclist, explains that an accident prompted him to design and develop the product. After 15 years of accident free riding, he was hit by a car in 2007. “I landed on my face,” he recalls. “The ac­cident really shook me up. I did a few more races, but eventually lost my drive.” Fortunately, Evan chose to focus on the design for a cyclometer with a rearview camera at that time. “I wanted to create something to make it safer to ride a bike. My design background really helped me pull the pieces togeth­er. Everything—the skills and the resources—fell into place.”

In addition to displaying the current rearview on the screen, the unit features accident detection and recording (a very useful feature that a few commenters suggested in response to the earlier posts). It will also offer ANT+ compatibility for heart rate and power-measuring systems, and a GPS antenna for a mapping software upgrade in 2012. As you can tell from my past posts, this is a product that I am pretty excited about. I can’t wait to try it out once it is available and I will share my impressions when I do.