Cycle News

VOL. 52 ISSUE 6 FEBRUARY 10, 2015 P69 a state of the art New Classic Husqvarna, in my opinion for sure it will be successful. So those prototypes we showed in EICMA will start production in October 2016 for sale to the public in 2017, but not completely in India. What we are already doing on the Dukes, which we are bringing to Europe, is that they are not finally as- sembled due to transportation space. We are im- porting rolling chassis to Austria with the front end not attached, and we then build it up and ship it to our dealers. So for the Husqvarna New Classic models up to 390cc, we will receive those KTM rolling chassis from India with the engine installed as at present. Then we will finalize the assembly in Mattighofen and turn them into Husqvarnas here in Austria. We can't overstretch our partner, because they already build so many different models in Pune. Flexibility is not really the Indians' strength, so keep it very standardized, very clear, very stable, then it works very well. This by definition means you'll have con- tinued expansion here in Austria. How many people do you presently employ in Mattig- hofen? Last year our production volume in Mattighofen was 102,000 bikes, an all-time high. To build them, out of a total worldwide workforce of 2,100 KTM AG employees we had almost 1800 in Aus- tria, in Mattighofen and the neighborhood. But if you take into consideration our wholly owned subsidiary WP [suspension company], it's another 550 people. WP is doing 120 million Euro volume in 2014, so that adds up to 2,500 employees all told in Austria. That being so, will you continue to only make KTMs in Europe here in Austria, in Mat- tighofen, or will you establish a satellite fac- tory anywhere else? Maybe in the USA, like BMW with their Z4 sports cars? No, this is the best place. I've done a lot of benchmarking over the last 22 years. I owned KTM, first with Italy, then Germany, then Spain, then more or less everywhere, and Austria's the best place in Europe for KTM, and Mattighofen specifically. There have been motorcycles built here for the past 60 years, and anyway not every- thing is in files or drawings. You need very skilled, dedicated employees who are also very flexible. There's still a lot of skilled craftsmanship done by hand building a KTM, even though everything is controlled and measured digitally. So I need em- ployees who can do three different types of work a day, rather than make thousands of the same thing in each shift. With the increased sales volume has KTM gone to two shifts yet? No. On the final assembly we are still doing just one shift, because the best people like to work in the daytime, not on a night shift, and we need the best people. We've talked about internal combustion engines so far, but how about electric? KTM was one of the first major manufacturers to become involved with this, so what are your plans for future E-products? Originally when we started with an electric off- road bike almost seven years ago, it was practi- cally forced on us by the fact that it's becoming more or less forbidden to ride off-road anywhere in Central Europe. That was the starting point for the development program. And back then there were no suppliers for suitable electric motors, or the software, so basically we had to do every- thing ourselves together with some dedicated suppliers. So now we are ready and we have just recently started series production of a customer product—the Freeride E in three different ver- sions. We've had a very good demand from the specific group of customers this is aimed at… who want to have something silent they can ride in their garden or neighborhood, or else they wouldn't be able to ride at all. I like this approach through sport and racing, because otherwise you are just providing mobility with electric power, and this is not sexy–yet. But I'm convinced that in 10 years' time a major part of urban mobility will be based on electric vehicles.

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