Harley's New Adventures

A slew of 16 new bike s from Harley- Davidson , and not a single cruiser! Instead what you’ve got is a pair of adventure tourers, nine new streetfighters, five custom bikes and a bunch of 250- 500cc bikes built with an unnamed Asian partner.

IN ITS 115-YEAR HISTORY Harley-Davidson has shown an unwavering loyalty to the cruiser genre of motorcycles. To a point where it’s impossible to conceive of an all American cruiser without the famous bar and shield logo popping up in your head somewhere. For the first time since 1903 however, Harley’s list of products scheduled for the immediate future don’t have a dyed-in-the-wool American cruiser motorcycle. The company wants to grow its international business by 50 percent by the year 2027. To that end, they have stitched together Harley’s most aggressive product strategy. A strategy that will see the brand launching no less than 100 new products, 16 of them by as early as 2022. A strategy that no longer focuses on the home turf.

While the rest of the world is happy getting swept up in the euphoria of a slew of two adventure bikes, nine (!) streetfighters and five custom bikes, the most significant news for us in India is Harley’s announcement of a venture to build 250-500cc motorcycles in collaboration with an as yet unnamed Asian partner. Harley intends to leverage the partner’s manufacturing scale and retail footprint. While the scale of operations of the partner will help Harley lower production costs, and ensure competitive pricing of its new product, leveraging its retail footprint will ensure that the company doesn’t have to get into the investment-heavy process of building the retail infrastructure necessary for the distribution of high volumes (by Harley standards) products, which is what these 250-500cc motorcycles will be.