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FEDERICO MINOLI product line? Once we have a clear idea of what's victory for Ducati, with Neil Hodgson following on a out there for us, then we can decide better what - 999. It's worth underlining that Pauline was kind idea comes next. enough. to contribute the money that we paid her to Riders For Health, which as you know is the charity HOW about an entry-level volume production we support. I think that's a fine gesture. Ducati model? Do you feel there's a need for such a product, and if so, what form should it Any plans to market a 25th Anniversary Mike take? How about a Ducati scooter? Hailwood Replica of the 999 to commemoYou see, I always like to say that Ducati is a rate this? tribe, and of course you need an entry door to Hmm - no, but that's a very good idea. Just this tribe - though right now, our entry door is reasondon't expect us to pay you for it! ably expensive. Our most successful such bike is the Monster 620 Dark, and an astonishing number of Let's turn to Bimota. Is it true that you've people who never owned a motorcycle before entered made an agreement with Lorenzo Ducati, son into our family via the M620 - something like 40 perof one of this company's founders, and his partner cent of all the buyers, which is terribly high. But while Giuseppe Della Pietra, to supply engines to the we do have an effective if comparatively costly entry revived Bimota company so that its future range is door to the Ducati family, we could consider another exclusively powered by Ducati? entry-level product. However, you will not see the There is no formal agreement, but they asked us Ducati equivalent of a scooter or any basic means of for the engines, and we said we would be willing transportation because we don't have the industrial to supply them. I guess it all depends if they can find structure to do it. Anyway, I think we're much better enough money to get started again, but - yes, we will sell them Ducati engines for whatever they make. off remaining a niche brand, because in this niche we know we can make a profit - and I don't see so many We're quite willing to support them, because I believe that the more interest we raise in Italian niche prodscooter companies turning a profit right now! ucts, the better we enlarge this segment of the market YOU know I won't let you get away without as a whole, in which we'll always get our fair share. So I want to see MV Agusta back on track. I would asking this! Why won't you make the Superhave liked to see Benelli prospering and wish Merloni mono with lights, for the street?!. Especially as all good luck in achieving that, and I'm happy to help you can add value and performance by fitting a supercharger, which has been proven to work Bimota get back in business - because by enlarging the market for Italian or even European brands world. effectively on single-cylinder motorcycles, reprewide, we increase Ducati's chance to do better. senting an avant garde form of proven technology that on two wheels would be unique to Ducati and would allow you to position the model advantaone reason Italian motorcycles command such fervent admiration around the world is geously pricewise. F;rom my point of view, this is a matter of pribecause of the quality of their design and styling. orities. We are a small company, so we have Massimo Tamburini is revered as the Michelangelo to choose what's most important. Do we develop of motorcycling, and of course he was responsible a single? Do we make a four? Do we produce a for the Ducati 916, for many people the quintesthree-valve air-cooled twin? Or how about a sential bike design of the 1990s. Is it true, as triple? I don't think we can afford to bring too rumored, that you recently approached him to many kinds of engines through to production, design another bike for Ducati? because although you're correct when you say The answer is no. We know that Tamburini is that we've done all the hard work in actually extremely loyal to Castiglioni, and while he has all our admiration and it would be a dream to work designing a prototype Supermono, from there to actually rolling the first engine off the production with him again, he has made other choices, which line will cost us approximately five million Euros we respect. ($5.78 million). Can we really expect to turn that much profit from such a product? That's what we What response do you have to the accusation have to ask ourselves. I'm not going to take this surfacing increasingly often of late that company down the road of overinvesting as comDucatis are overpriced? In view of the current pared to the size that we have and the profit we downturn in the market, have you considered want to generate. So - sorry! reducing your prices as a response to this? well, I think if you look at our prices, we have already significantly reduced some of them. Look Okay , but you have produced niche market special edition models using existing engines, at the Monster 620, which is now available at an such as the MH900e. Do you plan any more in the entry-level price, which did not exist before. The Multinear future - such as the PS750e Paul Smart strada is most definitely not overpriced - it has a very Replica celebrating his (mola 200 victory in 1972, competitive sticker. But I do think that if we want our which Pierre Terblanche is reputed to have been products to have the technology, to have the quality working on for some time? and to have the racing heritage all wrapped up in a Stay tuned, and keep checking our website single high-end package, we are bound to be at a prewww.ducati.com to know when you have to mium price over our Japanese competitors. It's the same way that Harley-Davidson has a premium price place your order by. That's all I can say right now! over the others - not overpriced, not excessive but just speakin g of the MH900e, is your dispute and appropriate. It's a systemic issue· we cannot with Pauline Hailwood about using Mike's compete on volume, so we cannot compete on price, because our industrial system does not permit it. So name in connection with this model now resolved? Yes. I think we arrived at a mutually satisfacto·· what can we do? We can add something to the prodry settlement. which brings Pauline and her son uct that justifies the premium price. We have the herDavid back into our family, which is where I think itage, the soul, the character, the ongoing World they belonged all along. To mark this, David will be Superbike and GP success, to all of which we add the riding his father's bike in the TT Lap of Honor in World of Ducati, which is really working nicely for us June on the 25th anniversary of Mike's great TT right now in terms of making our customers feel part Q Q A A Q A Q Q A A Q A Q A Q A 26 JULY 16, 2003' cue • e of the Ducati family. Which, of course, they are. However, we will add entry doors into our world - the Monster 620 is one of them, the 620 Sport another, and we are thinking about building some other entry doors in terms of pricing, because we've found out we have a repeat purchase level which is amazingly higher than any other brand except Harley, which is the same. That's really astonishing - we have a repeat purchase level twice as high as Honda, for example. Part of the sense of belonging is fostered by the WDW/World Ducati Weekend and DRA/Ducati Revs America events, which you've pioneered in the past and which rival marques like Aprilia are now copying_ Do you plan to con· tinue these? Very much so . and we'll keep adding new ones. For example, this year we're organizing the third Motogiro, which has become an annual event, and now we have the Centopassi later in the year, which is a kind of Italian version of the U.S. Iron Butt rally, inspired by the guy who makes my pizza in a little vil· lage not far from here. He's done about 40,OOOkm (24,800 miles) in a year on a Monster S4 that he owns, covering all these one hundred mountain passes around Italy, and it was from hearing him brag about this that we got the idea for the Centopassi. Should be fun - I'm going to do it myself on a Multi· strada, and then maybe I can start bragging to him! Q A MaYbe he'll give you a free pizza! But how about the WDW and DRA - will they be held again in 2004? WDW for sure, in June - yes. But DRA is not certain· there's been such a total freeze on con· sumption in the USA, so that for instance for the first time in many years Harley registrations have actually declined by 3.5 percent, which is a worrisome signal. Their sales went up, but registrations dropped, which means they're loading up their dealers with stock, which is contrary to our policy. We need to be sure that it would be well enough attended to go back to Las '(egas again, though we'd like to do so. Q A Lookin g at Ducati's future product mix, and leaving aside the issue of a possible high-end V4 range ... (Interrupting) Double-two! Q A ... of course· that'd make it different from your MotoGP bike with its conventional firing order so would skirt the FIM prototype rules! But leaving that aside, will Ducati continue to focus exclusively on desmodromic V-twin motorcycles with a sporting flair - no singles, no triples, no valve-springs, no narrow-angle V-twins? Not so long as I'm herel But do you think maybe we should produce a non·desmo bike? A Not unless it ~as pneumatic valve operation, which could be perceived as a modern version of desmodromic technology. WhiCh we will not do, by the way· even though we considered that when we were looking at the desmosedici, to the point we had it designed, developed, stuff like that. But then on the computer we found out that the performance with the pneumatics was not significantly better than the desmo, the cost was of course enormously higher, and it represented a radical departure from our existing traditions. So once we were sure we were not giving up any perfor. mance, we opted to stay with the traditional desmo valve operation, and I must say judging by the way the bike accelerates, maybe it wasn't such a bad decision after all! CN Q A 4Jft ne'UVs