Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

Ducati Corse dea l is done and that's all sorted out now, I've got some proposals from other people who are very interested in having some kind of corporate support from us - all the way down to just a bit of help. And I've got a whole bag of requests, wh ich I'm looking to be favorab le as I possibly can on. We wou ld like to extend the reach of Ducat i North Ame rica support for racing over here, beyond the head line of a Superb ike team. I would like to get more involved in othe r classes. I wou ld like to reach down into regional series as well. So, we've got a number of things that we're looking to tie up between now and the end of the year. Some will happen , some wo n't . On the Daytona 200: 1 wou ld love to be in the Daytona 200. I would rat e our chances at the moment at less than 50 -50 . Here's th e problem: We would have to race w ith the 749R, and Ducati Corse have not dev eloped t he 749R as an e ndurance machin e. That's the bottom line of the problem . If 1 can convince the m to build me one over th e w inte r - and believe you me I'm trying everything I've got - we wo uld love to be part of that. And we think if they could build the machine , we could be competitive. So I would love to do it, but I'm not hold ing my bre ath . On how Ducati ha s managed to increase registrations by 20 percent in the United S tates in 2004: I would love to say it's because we're doing such a fantastic job over here, but it's a couple of things. The first thing is that all the major motorcycle markets in Europe are somewhat depressed this year, particularly at the top end, the premium end of the market, which of seesaw sales in the U.S. We had a lot of instability in the company, and we moved the corporate head quarters from the East Coast to the Wes t Coast 18 months ago. That caused a tremendous amount of disrup tion . We had a high inventory of noncurrent models even as recently as six or e ight months ago. We've just been aggressively working through the inventory problems, and we've been going back to the core part of our business . By running a full factory-backed AMA team this yea r with Eric Bostrom, we sent the message out that we take racing over here se riously again after many yea rs of being rather sem idetached . And we've had some good new dealer appointments, and the team at Ducati North America is working very hard. So the results of being up here were merely a re flection of a lot of hard work be ing done. On h ow much work it was t o turn the company around: On paper, it really shou ldn't have set us back at all. Companies relocate all th e time. But the problem we had was a lot of th ings going wrong all at the same time . And not only did we move the corporate office but managed to lose pretty much all the talent that worked in New Jersey. Very few people either were offered to the opportunity to come west or, even the ones who we re offered, most of them didn't want to. So we transplanted to the West Coast with pretty much a completely new head office infrastructure , which, that's dangerous. In a small, very personable business like ours, that's a very dangerous thing to do . That was one problem. "I would love to be in the Daytona 200.1 would rate our chances at the moment at less than 50-50." obviously we derive most of our sales from . The German market is down, the French market is flat, the U.K. market is heavily down, and the Italian market is depressed on anything over 750cc. So all of that impacts us. I think the markets are down primarily because of general economic woes in Europe rather than anything speci fic to mo torcycles. And you'd probably find the same res ults reflected from BMW or Triumph or Aprilia, or really any of t he other major European brands. The reason we'.re up in t he U.S. is that we're very aggressively pursuing a new strategy. We've had four or five years l o ck called former World Superbike Champion and MotoGP racer Neil Hodgson's entry into the 200S AMA Suprbike Championship a big deal for Ducati North America. The second problem was tha t the corporate move coincided with us changing our IT [information tech nologies1 system - not only ou r in-ho use IT system, but also the way that we handle IT at dealers. We rep laced a rather simple and pretty slow, but dependable, old system with a very radical and far-reac hing IT system that we're still knocking the bugs out of now two years later. And that cripp led us for nigh on six mo nths in terms of supplying parts to deale rs, paying warranty claims, in administering dealer's accounts - it absolutely cripp led us. We didn't know what was going on . And this was on top, of course, of having this new team, wh o were inexperie nced. And while we were at it, we decided to outsource the warehousing and delivery of our bikes fo r the first time in our recent history. And we outsourced the warehousing and distribution of our parts, all at the same time. It has been mentioned that it was a very long suicide note . Altho ugh it doesn't feel like that now, the pain is gone. On why t he Duca ti 999 w a sn 't very w ell recei ved originally: It was a difficult model introduction ; partly because it was rep lacing a legend, partly because t he www.cycieneW5.com timing of the launch, I think we can say with hindsight, it was a little awkward. The bike was introduced in September but actually introduced into deale r showrooms, which of course is the e nd of t he sportbike riding season. If we had been able to introduce the bike more conventionally, we might have saved ourselves some trouble. So it came in and it was replacing a bike that was wildly popular. And we found ourselves, from the outset, having to be defensive with the bike , w hich was a shame, because the bike is superior in every respect to the bike it re places. But we were on the defensive because peop le were questioning the change in the style, and a major part of t he launch publicity was that the bike was a lot more comfortable, wh ich of course it is. But if you ' re selling a hyperbike and you 're selling it as being more com fortable , you 're really rather missing the point . The bike was quicker and better handling everywhere, as we llas being more comfortable. But I t hink t he emphasis we were putt ing on ... and it was largely as a result of the feedback we had with the previous bikes: If you 've ever ridde n a 916 or a 996, the best point about it is tha t it was such a visceral mechanical motorcycle; the worst point about it was that it was a pain in t he ass after riding it for about half an hour. And we had learned over a IO-year period that a lot of peo ple who fantasized over owning one never bought one because they co uldn't fit on it. If you're a normal North American -sized rider, chances are you do not fit on a 916 or a 998 . They're built for little guys. And a major part of the des ign brief on the new bike was to make it more accessible for street riders, w hich it's pe rfectly fulfilled. As I say, if you're launching a new superbike, wha t you want to be ta lking abo ut is how nasty it is, not how nice it is. And I think the company's learned a lot in the two years since we've had the 999 about how to market tha t bike correctly. We're anticipating a 25-percent sales increase on superbikes next yea r, wh ich would be the biggest increase we've had in 10 years . CYCLE NEWS • DECEMBER 15 , 20 0 4 37

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