Honda Motorcycle & Scooter India (HMSI), which claims to have 11 percent of the domestic midsize bike market currently, is now looking to augment its share further to 25 percent by 2025. The Indian two-wheeler subsidiary of Honda Motor Company, Japan, which sells premium bikes such as CB350 RS, CB300R, and CB H’ness 350 will be introducing more products in middleweight bike category apart from ramping up its BigWing signature showrooms. The company has just launched its naked streetfighter motorcycle CB300F, which will be available at Rs 2,25,900 for Deluxe variant and Rs 2,28,900 for Deluxe Pro variant respectively (ex-showroom) at 100 Big Wing outlets.
Rajagopi Padmanaban, Operating Officer, Premium Motorcycle Business, Honda Motorcycle & Scooter India said, “The size of the midsize bike market used to be one million units (per annum) three years back. After COVID and later the semiconductor crisis, it has gone down to roughly 600,000 units a year. However, in the next three years, this segment will rebound to one million units (per annum). In the process, we hope to achieve a 25 percent share of that pie.”
As per Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM), total two-wheeler sales declined to 13,466,412 units in FY 2021-22 from 15,120,783 in the previous year. The industry had an all-time high record of 21,179,847 units in FY 2018-19, as per the auto industry body. Within that space, the middleweight bike segment (ranging from above 250cc to 800cc segments) saw a slight uptick in numbers from 733,779 units in FY21 to 7,54,153 units in FY22, as per SIAM. Apart from HMSI, firms such as Royal Enfield, Bajaj Auto, Harley Davidson (discontinued operations), Kawasaki, BMW, TVS, Triumph, and Suzuki Motorcycle India are the other players in this segment.
Incidentally, Honda CB300F’s launch comes just a day after Royal Enfield rolled out the new Hunter 350 (in Thailand) at Rs 149,900 lakh (ex-showroom, Chennai). The company has positioned the product as a ‘two-wheeled double-espresso’ of motorcycles.
When asked why the company is so upbeat about the premium bike segment, Padmanaban stated, “Since October 2020, despite multiple waves of COVID, we managed to sell 60,000 units of high-end bikes till June 2022. That means there is a scope to garner more numbers as the crisis is abating."
When queried about the distribution expansion, he said, “Apart from launching more products, our BigWing showrooms will also be more than doubled from 100 currently to 250 around that timeline. Interestingly, a significant share (of volumes) will be derived from tier 2 and 3 cities.”
Powering the CB300F is a new 293cc, liquid-cooled, four-valve, SOHC engine that churns out 23.8bhp and 25.6Nm of peak torque and is mated to a six-speed manual gearbox along with an assist and slipper clutch. To be rolled out from its Gujarat plant, it will be taking on other streetfighters like the BMW G 310 R (around Rs 2.70 lakh) and the KTM 390 Duke (approximately Rs 2.96 lakh).
Atsushi Ogata, Managing Director, president and CEO, HMSI said, “It is very difficult to share any numbers at this point. Our immediate priority is to strengthen the midsize bike market.” When quizzed about the company’s medium to long-term plans for this model’s export, he maintained, “We have been shipping out our products to 38 countries. If there is a potential, we will consider it.”
Meanwhile, Ogata has also affirmed that after seeing the phenomenal response to electric scooters in the country, HMSI is gearing up to roll out its maiden e-scooter by early 2023. Even though the company did not reveal the name of the maiden e-scooter, there is a lot of buzz that the electric variant of its bestselling Activa scooter will be introduced at Rs 110,000 next year.
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