Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/502215
IN THE WIND P38 HERO MOTOCORP SETS NEW SALES RECORDS I ndian giant Hero MotoCorp has announced its global sales grew by 6.2 percent in its April 2014-March 2015 financial year, selling 6,631,826 powered two-wheelers. This compares to 6,245,960 units in the previous fiscal year, finishing the past 12 months with 531,750 unit sales in March 2015, up from 524,028 units one year previously. "FY'15 was a year of mile- stones at Hero MotoCorp—in terms of our sales performance, expansion of our global foot- print, product innovation and customer engagement," said Pawan Munjal, Hero MotoCorp's Vice-Chairman, Managing Director and CEO. "Our record sales performance during the past year is reflective of all these efforts." Also in March, HMC-MM Auto Ltd.—a joint venture between Hero MotoCorp and Italian- based Magneti Marelli—inaugu- rated its first standalone Produc- tion and Development Center near Hero's headquarters in New Delhi. The new center will serve as a production facility and development hub to evolve new-generation fuel systems for Hero models. Thanks to this, Hero is set to become the first Indian motorcycle and scooter manufacturer to develop and manufacture its own electronic fuel injection products, says the company. However, this record perfor- mance and its continued R&D expansion asks further ques- tions surrounding Hero's deci- sion to allow EBR, its Wiscon- sin-based American joint venture with Erik Buell in which it held a 49.2 percent equity share, to file for bankruptcy on April 15. The use of the little-known Chapter 128 receivership pro- cess means that under Wiscon- sin state law EBR's assets will now be sold off to the highest bidder. And with more than 100 employees of the now defunct EBR working on new Hero models prior to the bankruptcy, the Indian giant is sure to be the front-runner for the purchase of those assets. This would then allow Hero to rebrand the born again com- pany as a wholly owned U.S. subsidiary for future model development purposes, as well as a base—complete with warehousing—for future distribu- tion of Hero products in North America. Under Chapter 128 this would come without any liability for any warranty or man- datory spare parts backup for the 1,000 or so 1190cc V-twin motorcycles understood to have been manufactured by the old EBR concern, and delivered to customers in North America, Europe and Australasia. Alan Cathcart MULTISTRADA RECALL ISSUED D ucati North America issued a recall notice for certain Multistrada machines manufac- tured from 2010-2014. The notice was submitted to the NHTSA on March 13, 2015, and states that "the inner sleeve of the opening throttle cable may move and prevent the full closing of the throttle. If the throttle cannot be fully closed, there is an increased risk of a crash." Ducati will be notifying owners, and dealers will be replacing the upper throttle cover with a new item that stops the inner throttle sleeve from moving, free of charge. There are 5,962 Ducati Multistradas that are believed to be affected by the recall. The NHTSA Campaign Number for this recall is 15V152000. For more information, call Ducati Customer Service on 1-800-231-6696.