Hi Ken Bro,

Well, I feel that even we bikers have different choices. This further breaks up the market. It's not that we are "LESS" in amount. The problem is that, We are all different in needs & demands.

For instance, There may be about 5000 Xbhp bikers who can want to & can purchase a Sbk potentially (if priced fairly), with about 1 Lacs in this country as a whole... ok?

And For example, if Yamaha releases a FZ6 now at 5 Lacs, Will all of you buy it?
No, I bet many of you won't! And you all have your reasons:-->

- you might "then" say that 400 is more appropriate,
- you might want a litre class,
- you might say "Ok, good job Yamaha! but I'll purchase it maybe next year or 2 or 3"
- you might say "I want a Fairing. Bad job Yamaha!"
- you might say "Yuck, FZ6 sounds like a Sewing Machine"


What do you have to say to this? Can we ever be united for "One Particular Bike"?? CBU is different, but in country production requires large sales to make it a success.

Atleast, I can take any 600, and try to adjust it for my whatever needs.

But, can all of us do that? No, we cannnot... Being Humans, we all have choices...

and that kills the market for ever. Hence, "In country SBK" Chapter Closed by Manufacturers.

It isn't that Bajaj/TVS cannot go the whole hog and give us a 40Bhp+ twin for under 3 Lakhs or so. The issue is that they don't want to. All that, the Indian manufacturers want to do is to milk the market to the maximum and focus on the economuter segment. Now they are slowly upping the ante and are have a slew of 150s. Next, they will move to the 180-200cc category. Why? Simply because they do not want to leave the categories "in-between" unexploited. A few thousand enthusiasts crying hoarse for better powered machines just isn't enough for the Indian manufacturers. Though we, the dyed-in-the-wool bikers are prepared to go out and buy 400cc+ machines, we just do not represent enough money, which the millions of the economuters do. So, the bike manufacturers will continue to stick to their small increments approach till the market is "ripe" wnough for them to exploit. Till then, we just have to wait and hope for the best, like we have been doing for the last two decades. Profits, not passion is what dictates motorcycle manufacturing in this country and I don't see that changing any time soon.

I understood what you said, you and me have the same feeling of trying something new.......and i also agree with your opinion of its taking too long for new bikes...hope the manufacturers and others are reading this topic and learning something.

There isn't any better. I think you got a decent price too if it is in excellent condition. I just hope that you manage to cover services and spares without having to run from pillar to post.

Or get your parts imported yourself by preempting the needs. Coz Kinetic is not going out of its way to help you. That is the sad part. Else, I rode the Comet for 2 years, 15K kilometres, touring till Gramphu, Jaipur, Agra... I was more than happy.

AAp ne mere muh ki baat cheen li


I have just bought an Aquila yesterday for the simple reason that there is no choice in the 250 cc twin machine except the aquila.this is the only thing to hit the Indian shores in a century of biking history .
I had a choice between the thunderbird and Aquila and i choose the latter .I paid 110grand for 2003 june model xlnt condition .pl let me know if my decision was right or not

These days marketing strategy of HH is worst(at least i feel so ) and probably the best is YAMAHA and TVS, Yamaha is back and TVS came from nowhere and gave us some good bikes

@Mr. Ken.

Thank you for replying, it feels great when somebody reads your post and replies, this is my first write. Talking about bengal your opinions are 100% true. I know Bangalore and other places has got more sbks than bengal. Its normal that some place will grow fast and other will not, but the problem is not with the place, the poblem is in us......you want a super bike and me too, but how many peoples besides you and me also wants them ??

Say we have 1000+ members in XBHP, and may be there are 100K+ other people who loves bike, but this 100K people doesn't makes this country.

If someone wants to spend say 10 lakh for a vehicle, he will buy a four wheeler but not import a superbike, then why will the companies make bigger bikes ?? I agree that some people are different, some buys SBKs, but their counts are too few. Bikes here in India are mainly sold for youths, and our Dads and Uncle still goes for smaller CC bikes. And then rash drivers, for them the whole bikers community are becoming criminals..You love bike and people will call you MAD, even my mom, dad and others has the same opinion for me.

There are two solutions, like what Yamaha did, they brought a 150 cc and priced it 1 lakh, people love it and bought it, so other also should have the guts and do the same........now we cant except that suddenly companies will bring 500+ cc bikes in this market and price them 3-4 lakhs, it need to grow slowly for our country..then people will change and try something new.........One sentence from someone "People of our country dont like changes" (i have heard it somewhere, but cant remember whose line it is)

And the other solution is we need to take initiatives, we need to show them that we want something new other than pulsars and rtr, i aint saying they are bad bikes, they are really good, vut we want something new.

Well RD was never cheap too , when bullet costed 9 k , RD used to be for 18 and the cool japanese car (read m800) was for 27k.Still a lot of ppl bought the RD despite the huge price.

Dude, I feel there are many cases in which the companies fail to read the market. Best eg is Royal Enfield: I had a lot of sessions with the market manager about their strategy, There point on not selling the electra X and previously on the UCE 500 was that the Indian market cannot afford it(say 1.25L bike). Though we stressed a lot that its not right, they were not fully convinced. You remember when the 500LB was released it was supposed to be a limited edition just 500 pieces, (well there are other reasons for that too). Now they are slowly activating their grey cells.

To an extent when yamaha RD350 might fall as an eg to this.

and I would say the HH has a good study on the market

Psyco has a point and so does Ken !

The entire gist of this post is that there are people in the entire spectrum who have a point and we have lived without many options for far too long.

- guys with mom's and dad's worrying have a birth right to ride a 100cc
- guys consciously wanting to commute on 100cc have a right to choose to do so
but
- why should guys who want to step up in power, cc's, torque not have a right to choice..... there are quite a few of those in the country of 1 billion with a population at least equivalent of Australia in the affluent category or a sizable % who want go that way!!

Hello MrPsycho. Good response.

You know what... when I read your post and I saw the part "Strikes", you know what I did next instinctively... I looked at your avatar to figure out which part of the country you come from. And I was right. You know... I have lived in various parts of the country and of that a huge part in Bengal, notably Calcutta, born in Park Circus, Maryland Nursing Home...

You talking about money. You are absolutely right. But when you say the "number of times the country going into a strike" because of the rise in petrol prices... you know, the use of the word country is not totally apt here. It is West Bengal and at times Kerala. Staying New Delhi, Bombay, Bangalore, we have almost never seen a "Strike" for petrol prices going up and definitely not as often as one sees in Bengal. Do not take it badly, but Bengal sees more strikes than one gets to see in Italy and France. Bengal calls a National Bandh and the only thing that goes into a Bandh is Bengal. In my past 10 years in Delhi, I do not recall a single Bandh or strike. There have been striking lawyers, doctors, Bus Associations to oppose introduction of Gas kits in buses but not for rise of petrol prices.

Which is probably the reason why Bengal has so less industrial growth today, which is probably the reason Bengal has the lowest number of Sbks. The country, outside of Bengal used to see sales of close to a thousand Sbks every year in the country (unofficial approx figures) and none of them in Bengal. Only goes to say that there is a market. Probably not in Bengal. All I am saying is that if the pricing were right, with correct choice of vehicles, and the correct measures taken, CKD or total construction of a proper choice of power/torque development in a motorcycle, the market that exists, can be used to do "Better" business.

There has been a move from CD100 to DTS Fi220. The move is apparent in a LOT of bikers across the country. Even I am aware of what a biker is. And I am also aware of what he is looking for. Maybe not everywhere. But just look at the number of R15 bikes been sold. It is by no means a cheap acquisition for a beginner's bike. Nor is it for going just from point A to point B. It is a "Biker's" bike. And this is NOT for fuel efficiency. It has clearly dug into the sales of Zma and P220. Hence the market exists. Probably not in Bengal with all the Bandhs and strikes. But in the rest of the country, it does exist.

Again, I repeat, please do not take this personally.

Good write Mr Ken.

Some points (Personal Opinion, so no offense please )

But don't you think that Bajaj or HH or Yamaha guys dont know this ?? What they do here is "Business". If launching a 300cc+ bike will give them increase in buisness they will surely do that i guess. Can someone tell how many bikers are there in this country ? I am not asking the count of the people who own a bike. People from where i live still buys bike of 100-125cc, and you know why because they need bike for some reason and obviously that reason is not touring, love or their dreams. Owning a bigger capacity bike just dont end there, we have to maintain that, we need petrol to drive it. And you know very well how many times a year theres a strike in this country because of the petrol price goes up. Why do they call a strike ?? Yes, becuase money is a problem. There are some SBKs available in India, but how many people own those ?

Then as mentioned above roads are some obstacle, we normally dont ride on the highways always, most of us are city driver. We just cant move around on a SBK in the city.

Last but not the least, people feel safer in cars but not in bikes, and everyone knows the reason.My mom still worries when i ride to office in my bike. May be these are enough reason that Yamaha and all those companies are not bringing big machines. We need to grow up first.


Sorry for bad english

well thats my point

well may be the show room can confirm the news..

prabhu : see these -

Italian 2-wheeler Ducati forays into India - The Financial Express

domain-b.com : Ducati comes riding to India at prices ranging from Rs14 lakh to Rs48 lakh

@maverick : yes , a CB sounds more enticing than the ducati