The Peacedove and Starfish, now selling around $649, have a basic 3 level pedal assist. The big complaint, especially with older riders, is that level 1 is too fast, usually set above 10 mph. I believe they have done something with the Starfish to lower the level 1 speed, but could be wrong. I recall that the EBR reviewer really praised Qualisports for having a less aggressive, very smooth assist, so your friend might be disappointed with other low end bikes. However, most people do get used to it.
On these imports, I believe the generic 36V 10-12AH ebike batteries run close to $100 USD at cost. and the bikes are produced for $200, allowing an imported like Ecotric to have a nice margin and also be fairly generous with warranty. On the Ecotric facebook user groups, most users report getting replacement components fairly easily. What they don't get is expertise in finding out what was really wrong or any help in installing. A hands-on person who understands how to change tires won't have much problem with that, I've had an Ecotric bike for two years w/o any issues, except that it's a fat tire bike and I;d rather ride my other ones. I like smaller ebikes like your Qualisport. We have four of them.
I'd tell your friend to get a Qualisports. By the way, does the battery interfer with how low you can lower your seat?
If you're a facebook user you could join the Ecotric Ebike Fan Club and the Ecotric Bicycle Owners Group (administered by Ecotric) to get owner opinions.
Ancheer sells a $599 folding electric bike on Amazon. They have been around a lot longer than Ecotric and apparently succeeded without doing much customer support at all. I'd be more wary of them. It's not impossible to get an inexpensive ebike, but it helps if you know how to fix a bike, and also understand electricity. Yeah, that rules out lots of people.
