Honda Motorcycle and Scooter India Pvt Ltd has today announced their new overseas business expansion vertical. The brand wants to make-in-India and export their products to the world. As we are aware, India happens to be the most cost-effective when it comes to production and hence many companies export from here. This new overseas business vertical will be based out of Manesar and will effectively bring more than 100 associates together. This includes sales, purchase, quality, manufacturing, homologation as well as logistics. Depending on which country they are being sent to, the motorcycle or scooter will have a few changes. Most of the countries these days have Euro-V norms and these are quite similar to the BS6 that we have here. HMSI which debuted here in 2001, started exports with the Activa in the same year. In 2015, 10 lakh two-wheelers were exported by HMSI within 15 years of starting operations.
The export markets for Honda include south-east Asia, SAARC, Japan, Middle East, Latin and Central America, as well as Europe. Around 19 vehicle models are exported and the CB350 twins should add to these numbers. It is likely that Honda big bikes like the CBR650R as well as the CB650R might also be exported from here. However, that will only happen once HMSI starts making the bikes here and that is definitely sometime away. At present, both these bikes are priced at nearly Rs 11 lakh, on-road. This makes them the most expensive 650s to be on sale, barring the now-defunct Kawasaki ZX-6R. The latter though is an out and out track tool whereas the Hondas can be used daily as well.
Honda also has the exorbitantly priced CB500X model. The Honda CB500X price is closer to the higher-strung Kawasaki Versys 650. This could be one of the reasons why there might be not too many takers for the bike.
