INTRODUCTION TO TOPIC

OVERVIEW OF THE INDUSTRY

Motorcycles have made their debut around the 1950s;
this section looks at the two wheelers which have over
the years caught the imagination of country. It was in
the year 1954 that the Indian government ordered for
total number of 800 motorcycles to man the Pakistani
borders. In came the Bullets which were initially
launched in England as a 350cc bike and it was
upgraded to 500cc a year or so later. These bikes have
remained unaltered, barring some cosmetic changes
which have undergone over the years. Thus one can say
without much of a doubt that the 1955Bullet was one of
the initial hits of the Indian two-wheeler industry and
till today it continues to be a darling of the motorcycle
enthusiasts . Enfield Bullet had a close competition with
another sturdy bike named Rajdoot; as the bike was
strong enough to handle the rough Indian roads. The
company had roped in Indian He-man Dharmendra for
the promotion of the bike. With more than 1.6 million
vehicles on the road the Rajdoot motorcycle was one of
the initial hits of the earlier years of two-wheeler
history in the country . When heavy motorcycles were
the order of the day, a relatively lighter bike had caught
on the imagination of the Indian two wheeler user. Ind-
Suzukia bike launched by the then TVS Suzuki group
was an instant hit; however the bike could not sustain
its initial success due to the high import content in the
vehicle and less of localization. In scooters Bajaj Chetak
 has been hugely responsible for adding momentum to
the transport system of the country, till today it remains
one of the most successful brands to have come out of
the Bajajstable. The scooter is named after the horse of
legendary Rana pratap Singh. These sets of two wheel
shave become a part of the Indian milieu and are often
considered a representative of the Indian middle class
aspiration. Very few two-wheelers have been able to
emulate the success, which Bajaj Chetak has achieved
over the years .Similarly LML Motors enjoyed a
reasonable success with the launch of LML Select which
came with new age technology and improved
performance.
 

Today newer models of two-wheeler are entering the

market everyday, slowly pushing thesenames down the
memory lane. However names like Chetak, Rajdoot and
Bullet will always find amention in the history of two-
wheelers in the country.The Indian two-wheeler industry
is dominated by three players, Bajaj, Hero and TVS Suzuki,
whoaccount for 80 percent of the total two-wheeler
market. The other players including KineticEngineering,
LML and others account for the remaining 20 percent of
the market. The industrycan be divided into three broad
segments: Scooters, motorcycles and mopeds. In the
scooterssegment Bajaj is the market leader, Hero is the
market leader in the motorcycles segment and inthe
segment of mopeds, TVS controls the major chunk of the
market.Most Indian players in the two-wheeler industry
had been into some kind of strategic alliance,technical
collaboration or joint venture with foreign players, mainly
Japanese firms. Hero-Honda,is a joint venture between the

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Munjal-promoted Hero Group and Honda Motor Co. of
Japan; TVS-Suzuki was an alliance with TVS and Suzuki
Motors (till September 2001); Bajaj-Kawasaki a
jointventure between Bajaj Motors and Kawasaki; and
Yamaha-Escorts, a joint venture betweenEscorts and
Yamaha Motor Corp. (till June 2001).Indian automobile
market, be it the two-wheeler segment, the three-wheeler
segment or the carsegment, is yet to come to a stage
where all the models are developed indigenously. For
years now,Indian companies have been dependent on
their foreign joint venture partners or collaborators
to provide them with the technical know-how. This
trend too is in for a change. Leading the pack inthis arena
is Bajaj, which has been Successful at designing models in-
house. Bajaj's Saffire andSpirit have been able to bag the
scooter of the year award for 2003 and 2004 respectively.
In fact,its Spirit was adjudged the "Indigenous product
design of the year" for the year 2000. The
recentlylaunched Pulsar from the Bajaj stable is yet
another home-grown product, albeit in tandem
withJapanese design house, Tokyo R&D. Bajaj has been
laying increased emphasis on its R&D so asto be able to
launch new products to tap the markets at all possible
price points. Other companiestoo are adapting the
strategy of designing and developing products
indigenously. TVS's Victor isyet another development in
this direction and this indigenously built model has been a
success inthe markets.

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