NORTON CEO ROBERT HENTSCHEL

There's been much talk about the rise, fall, and rise of Norton Motorcycles over the last few months, if not years, so who better to ask about the true, behind-the-scenes details than their new head honcho?

- Alan Cathcart 

In January 2020 Norton Motorcycles, then owned and run by Stuart Garner, collapsed into bankruptcy, and on April 17 that same year was acquired from the liquidator - for a cash payment of £16 million - by India's third largest motorcycle manufacturer, TVS Motor Company. Currently manufacturing more than three million powered two-wheelers annually at its factory near Bangalore, TVS has also been associated with BMW Motorrad since April 2013. That's when the two companies signed a long-term contract for TVS to manufacture sub-500cc BMW-branded motorcycles for global sale, with over 100,000 examples of the single-cylinder BMW G310R and G310GS built in India for sale around the world. The BMW CE-02 electric scooter, which began production in October 2023, was also developed by the Indian manufacturer in conjunction with BMW.

After acquiring Norton, TVS invested a further £100,000 in establishing and equipping a new state-ofthe-art Norton factory on the southern outskirts of Birmingham, Norton's traditional home city where it was founded in 1898. TVS then re-engineered the existing Garner-era Commando 961 to make it production-friendly, and to meet Euro 4 compliance.

Even though it was under no legal obligation to do so, TVS management - led by joint MD Sudarshan Venu committed to manufacturing a series of Commando 961 Classic variants for delivery at no additional cost to the 29 customers who had paid Garner's by then defunct company for their bikes, before launching the updated product to the general public, as the first new series production Norton model under TVS ownership.