P20
IN
THE
WIND
APRILIA RETURNING TO MOTOGP?
T
he announcement on
November 5 at the
EICMA Milan Show by
Piaggio Group president
Roberto Colaninno that
Aprilia will return to MotoGP racing in 2016, after winning the World Superbike Championship in
2010 and 2012, has raised
more questions than answers. For it comes in the
wake of the closure of the
Aprilia factory at Scorzè
on October 15 for what
has been declared to be
two months (but is likely to
be at least three, with the
advent of Christmas and
the New Year holiday) owing to overproduction and a collapse in sales.
In the past five years Aprilia's
sales of motorcycles and scooters has slumped from 90,000
units in 2008 to just 30,000 in
2012, at a time when its Ducati
rival has recorded continued
growth, with record annual deliveries of over 44,000 bikes in
2013 with a comparable range
of products (albeit no scooters).
The MV Agusta boutique brand's
products have also outsold Aprilia's motorcycles - both in the Italian home market and in Europe
- as a whole during the past year.
This shutdown has seen Aprilia's 360-strong production personnel – a significant proportion
of whom are female - laid off,
with at least 100 of them likely
to lose their jobs permanently
as the company resizes its workforce in line with commercial reality. The fact that this comes at
a time when its sister motorcycle
brand in the Piaggio Group has
seen an encouraging uplift in its
performance, with Moto Guzzi
sales up 11.2 percent so far this
year, makes Piaggio's continued
commitment to the Aprilia brand
all the more questionable.
Yet in the face of this (and
flanked by Aprilia's new recruit to
its 2014 factory World Superbike
team Marco Melandri as well as
Piaggio's Motorcycle Technical
Director Romano Albesiano, who
Aprilia's last foray in MotoGP was
with the Aprilia Cube in 2003.
since October 10 has also taken
over as Aprilia's Racing Manager
after the shock resignation of his
predecessor Luigi Dall'Igna to
move to Ducati), Piaggio boss
Colaninno was very specific in
his expectations.
"After Aprilia's success in
Superbike racing, we intend to
come to MotoGP, and to be winners there from the very beginning," he declared. "I am not interested in finishing fourth or fifth,
I'm only concerned with winning,
because this is in Aprilia's DNA.
We are ready to embark on two
years of intensive development,
