I think they’re perfect for people in your sort of situation, and anyone else who wants one I guess.
I really think the core market is likely to be people looking to get back out after injury or loss of fitness, or trying to get fit and lose weight. Got to be much more fun actually covering some miles and having blast whilst building fitness than slogging away for a few miles on the same loop trying to build up slowly.
There will be some time/effort restricted folks who buy them, but they’ll be out riding a bike, so who cares, if it’s one more person cycling, it’s all good.
I rode one for the first time at the cycle show, a Haibike of some description, full sus, about 140mm I guess. I wasn’t a huge fan, it was bloody heavy, hard to pop the front wheel and on high mode I felt the assist was too much, slightly unnerving for me. In the real world I guess you’d only use high power mode for big hills. Batteries will evolve, as will motors, it will all be lighter and smaller in a few years, then I think they’ll be good, or better at least. I don’t really see them as the bike I’d want to chuck down a mountain though, so the long travel full sus thing seems a bit odd. A plus sized hardtail would be good for wheels on the ground mile munching though.