The “thump” is gone, but sales are booming.
Royal Enfield Motors, a 119-year-old Anglo-Indian motorcycle maker with a cult following, has brought its distinctive bikes into the modern era with new and quieter engines and can’t make them fast enough to meet demand.
The once-sleepy company sold 74,600 motorcycles last year — a 40 percent increase — all made at its 57-year-old factory on India’s southeastern coast, and it is spending US$30 million this fiscal year in a push to double capacity and upgrade manufacturing technology.
Photo: Reuters
For now, customers must wait six to nine months to get their bikes.
“Paradoxically, the more we make, the more we appear to be falling behind. Only when the new plant kicks in fully next year will we be able to fully address the waiting periods,” Royal Enfield CEO Venki Padmanabhan said.
A new engine has replaced Royal Enfield’s antiquated cast-iron engine, boosting acceleration, performance, mileage and reliability, as well as reducing emissions.
The company is best known for the powerful Bullet model, but it is the newer Classic series that is driving growth in a crowded and fast-expanding Indian market where 10 million motorbikes were sold last year.
“They’ve finally got the markings, the logo and the color schemes perfect,” said 35-year-old George Koshy, who works in an advertising firm and owns four Royal Enfield bikes, including a Classic 500.
Royal Enfield’s motorcycles start at 108,000 rupees (US$2,100) in Mumbai and rise to 175,000 rupees, against 72,000 rupees for a 220cc Bajaj Avenger, a similarly powerful bike also marketed toward enthusiasts.
Harley Davidson, whose bikes start at 560,000 rupees, is part of a slew of overseas manufacturers such as Britain’s Triumph and Japan’s Kawasaki that is ramping up activity in India to capture a growing premium motorbike market.
“If you want to ride for the heart, you ride the Bullet; if you want to ride for performance, you ride the Harley,” said Koshy, who plans to add a Harley Davidson to his collection.
Purists still come to the company looking to buy a bike with the old engine, but they have to go to the second-hand market as production ceased in 2010.
Royal Enfield originally built motorcycles to be parachuted into enemy territory by British forces during World War II, and the classic styling and trademark thumping of its engine at full throttle drew a legion of gearheads to the brand, including TV host Jay Leno.
It rolled out its first motorized bike in 1901 and entered the Indian market in 1949, where the Bullet, now in its 80th year of manufacture, became a staple on the country’s roads.
Royal Enfield, which stopped building bikes in Britain in 1970 and was bought by India’s Eicher Motors in 1994, expects to open a new 20 hectares plant in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu next year, taking capacity to 150,000 vehicles.
It is a niche manufacturer in a country where mass-market players led by Hero MotoCorp and Bajaj Auto sell cheap bikes as basic transportation and family vehicles.
The company sold just 3,200 bikes overseas last year and is looking to expand its export markets on the strength of its upgraded engines. It recently signed up dealerships in Malaysia and the Philippines, and is working to resurrect its distribution network in Germany and France.
An auto-industry veteran, the 49-year-old Padmanabhan started his career with General Motors in Michigan and took the top job at Royal Enfield in January last year after two years as chief operating officer.
“For many motorcycle companies, when they change engines it’s like life and death — if you don’t do it right you’re finished,” he said.
“For us we think we’ve been successful with the UCE engine, which just happened a little over a year ago, and there’s still a lot more to be done with this engine,” he said.
After several years flying high as Asia’s best Nvidia Corp proxy, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) is increasingly vying with other artificial intelligence (AI) stocks for investor attention. Stock traders are chasing a wider array of beneficiaries as mainstream usage of AI creates demand for hardware beyond the most-advanced chips TSMC makes for Nvidia. Subthemes from the deepening memory crunch to advances in robotics are also luring bids. At the same time, investment caps on single stocks are pushing funds to diversify, while retail investors long familiar with TSMC through its US depositary receipts are being offered a broader set of
UNDER MICROSCOPE: Taiwan detained three people who allegedly conspired to buy servers in Taiwan and export them using fraudulent documentation, prosecutors said Nvidia Corp chief executive officer Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) on Saturday urged Super Micro Computer Inc to tighten up on compliance after Taiwan detained three people this week for allegedly making fraudulent declarations about artificial intelligence (AI) servers made by its US partner. The development marked the nation’s first crackdown on semiconductor smuggling, which grew after the US slapped restrictions on exports of high-end chips such as Nvidia AI accelerators to China. Nvidia is “rigorous” in explaining regulations to all of its partners, Huang told reporters after arriving in Taipei. “Ultimately Super Micro has to run their own company,” he said in response to
TECH RELIANCE: Growth is increasingly reflecting an unequal K-shaped distribution, where technology sectors outperform and other industries struggle, an expert said Standard Chartered Bank has significantly raised its forecast for Taiwan’s economic growth to 9.5 percent this year, up from 7.6 percent previously, citing surging artificial intelligence (AI) demand driving exports, semiconductor production and investment. The upgrade reflects a sustained AI supercycle that continues to fuel demand for advanced chips and technology infrastructure, which form the backbone of Taiwan’s exports, the bank said in a report this week. “We raise our 2026 growth forecast to reflect a much stronger-than-expected first-quarter GDP figure,” Standard Chartered senior economist for greater China and Asia Tommy Wu (胡東安) said in the report. Driven largely by a 35.3 percent
Netherlands-based semiconductor equipment supplier ASML Holding NV yesterday said that it is planning to hire an additional 1,000 people in Taiwan this year in response to growing demand from clients. ASML had previously planned to recruit 600 people this year, but that the plan has been adjusted upward, ASML vice president and ASML Taiwan general manager Grace Wang (汪佳慧) told reporters. ASML has a workforce of more than 4,500 in Taiwan, accounting for about 10 percent of its global total, Wang said. This year’s recruitment campaign would focus on adding people in the customer support, manufacturing and supply chain domains to assist ASML
RSS