The sale of mopeds fell 30 per cent in the quarter ended September, but the sole manufacturer of the light-powered two-wheeler used in small-town India is confident business will bounce back
TVS Motor Company, India's third largest two-wheeler maker, sold 1,68,000 mopeds in the quarter ended September 2019, compared to 2,41,000 units during same period last year. The company's overall scooter sales declined by 14.17 per cent and motorcycle sales by 18.37 per cent in the same period.
K N Radhakrishnan, director and chief executive officer at TVS Motor, said demand in rural markets was weak after patchy monsoons in parts of the country. Besides, various factors like insurance premium, have increased on road prices by 12%.
“....there is a huge discounting from many of our players in the economy motorcycles (segment), so these are the two important factors which started affecting moped market,” he said.
TVS decided not to give discounts for mopeds, and instead introduced electric-start mopeds to boost sales. “I am pretty confident when the rural market starts coming back, (the) moped will come back in a big way,” said Radhakrishnan.
TVS is confident that the Bharat Stage VI emission norms will not shoot up moped prices.
“As the rural market starts coming back, we are pretty confident that the customers definitely will come forward to moped because it has got certain unique advantages vis-à-vis other products and that will continue to remain. And I am pretty confident that moped will come back even in a BS VI scenario,” said Radhakrishnan.
No comments:
Post a Comment