India is a country, where all the automobile manufacturers want to make their presence felt. It is a developing nation, the workforce is huge, and labour cheap and the companies want to exploit this feature. On the top of that list is, Harley Davidson Motorcycles. Since opening its first dealership in India in 2009 and starting assembly of its bikes in India in 2011, Harley has definitely come a long way. They are now concentrating on localized production and launching India oriented and Indian developed models.
Harley Davidson India recently unveiled the Street 500 as well as the Street 750 motorcycles at the 2013 EICMA motorcycle show, especially keeping in mind markets like India. These street motorcycles will be manufactured in India at their plant in Bawal, Haryana with heavy localisation of parts. The Street 750 will be launched at the 2014 auto expo, and the Street 500 would be launched at a later date.
Harley-Davidson says no plans to introduce lower capacity 250-300cc motorcycle
Recently there was a news on Economic Times which claimed that the US-based motorcycle manufacturer getting into the 250-300cc to gain more share in the market, especially for India. Furthermore, it was believed to have heavy localisation in the manufacturing process of the low-cost bike. Parts like the tires, all the rubber components, few plastic components, the fenders, cowls, headlamps and shock absorbers would be sourced from local vendors. This would cut costs by a huge margin and allow them to price the bike strategically.
Now our friends at Motoroids reports that Harley-Davidson has officially announced that they will not be making any 250-300cc motorcycle. The folks at Motoroids received an official phone call and an e-mail putting an end to the rumours and speculations going on about the 250-300cc Harley Davidson motorcycle.
The e-mail read, “We would like to inform you that Harley-Davidson has no plans of bringing in a 250-300 cc motorcycle.” Another quote from the company spokesperson clearly mentioned, “Recently, the Economic Times printed a highly speculative article about 250-300cc motorcycles from Harley-Davidson. While we do not comment on future products, in this case we can confirm that our only plans are to launch the new Harley-Davidson Street 750 at the 2014 Auto Expo, with an on-road price of under Rs5 lakh.”
Also see – Harley Davidson plans to launch made-for-India motorcycle
Harley Davidson’s India-bound Street 500 and Street 750 motorcycles unveiled
Source – Motoroids
