BIG BROTHER COMING

Yamaha to introduce a 250- cc YZF series bike soon

PUTTING AN END TO YEARS OF INTENSE speculation, India Yamaha Motor have finally confirmed that they are planning to launch a 250-cc motorcycle in the Indian market soon.

Speaking to the media, Hiroyuki Suzuki, CEO, India Yamaha Motor, recently stated that while the Japanese subsidiary would be focusing on scooter for the next two years, they would also launch a powerful, sporty, 250-cc bike in the Indian market in the meantime. He added that there was a good market for this premium segment which Yamaha Motor India would like to tap.

We reckon that the new bike will be a continuation of Yamaha’s sporty YZF series, which should ideally give it the name R25 – a fully faired, quarter-litre, high-performance model.

India has become an important market for Yamaha with the company also now focusing on the scooter segment. Yamaha will not introduce any new motorcycles for the next two years, but will keep updating their existing models. The Japanese marque will also launch a scooter series for different target segments in the country. Explaining the rationale behind this move, Suzuki san stated that the motorcycles manufactured in India met the advanced specifications of the developed markets and were produced at a comparatively lower cost. Once these two-wheelers are exported to Japan, their price becomes almost double.

Readers may recall that Yamaha are already exporting the YZF-R15 to Japan to test the market there and, as Suzuki san states, if the response is good enough, the company might consider more products for export to Japan and other advanced markets.

At present the 250-cc category has seen a duopoly of the Honda CBR 250R and the Kawasaki Ninja 250 in the Indian market. However, given the growing importance of performance biking in the country, players like Hero MotoCorp–ERB tie-up, Bajaj and TVSBMW technical partnership, manufacturers are taking a long and hard look at the 250s in the country and the future will surely see a lot many new players in this exciting segment.