Royal Enfield crosses Harley’s global sales: sells 3 lakh motorcycles in 2014

Indian player Royal Enfield has surpassed global sales of its indirect competitor Harley-Davidson; Royal Enfield sold 3 lakh motorcycles in 2014 as opposed to Harley’s 2.67 lakh. Chennai based Royal Enfield, which is one of the world’s oldest motorcycle brand manufactures motorcycles in the range of 350cc – 500cc while Harley-Davison’s range in India starts with their 700cc machines.

The highest priced Harley in India starts at Rs five lakh, while the highest priced Royal Enfield retails at Rs two lakh. This is a brilliant achievement by Royal Enfield as they are steadily gaining ground in the global market as well. Since Royal Enfield introduced new models with the new UCE engines, their popularity has soared and with the launch of the Continental GT in 2013, they’ve made waves in the right direction, keeping at par with the competition from the Japanese manufacturers.

For 2014 Royal Enfield’s sales grew at 70% as opposed to that of Harley-Davidson at 3%. Owned by Eicher Motors, MD &CEO SIddharth Lal said that he now wants to build a strong presence for Royal Enfield motorcycles in the Eurpean and US markets.

The step up for Royal Enfield is huge as they were doing only 50,000 unit annually unit 2010. Royale Enfield is still to bring out an engine more than 535cc to compete with the bigger brands, but in a smart starategy they have hired from competing brands like Harley-Davidson and Ducati. In 2014 Royal Enfield hired Rod Copes, Harley’s head of global sales as its President for the North American business; they also hired Ducati designer Pierre Terblance as its chief designer.

Source: Times of India