If I were On the board at Ducati, I would be very nervous right about now. Harley might just string you along just long enough to kill that company. Besides, what would Harley realistically do with an Italian super bike company. They couldn't even take care of the Buells that they contracted to care for very long. I know that in alaska you are just plain out of luck if you can't fix it yourself. Not even the little shops here will touch it.
But then again, the Harley shop here in Fairbanks Alaska sells Harley, Honda, BMW, Polaris, and for quite a while they sold Victory. So I could see them dealing Ducati if they could turn a buck. I did hear that the Indian dealer buy in is crazy high and the dealer has to be able to show $2 million in assets. Kinda hard to do these days with the smaller dealers.
Since Harley is already losing so much market share (not a secret) and just got a .gov bailout (not a secret), they get to use that money (OUR money!!) to buy Ducati, then suck the profits out of them?
'Murica...
This can't happen then... say it isn't true! I don't have much love for the big chrome cruisers but if this is all true Ducati must be smarter than this.Originally Posted by Cooter
Audi hasn't owned them all that long. Not sure how much profit can be sucked out. The 2 cylinder bikes racing in WSBK may not be around much longer since inline 4 electronics have caught up in performance. Ducati probably needs to change to a V4 engine like their MotoGP bikes to stay competitive, which is quite a break from tradition. Not sure if 1 or 2 engine Harley will dump the cash in to design a new engine. I love that a small company like Ducati has beaten the crap out of the Japanese giants over the last 25 years.
You know, I wonder if Harley is reading the writing on the wall that's telling them they are headed towards hard times and bought Ducati to have a scape goat when they fall on their face. Then they will disembowel Duc and use the revenue to nurtue their 30hp sofa line up. Basically like they did to Buell....
If you loose market share, as a business, there are only two ways to regain it. ( Simplified. )
1.) Rework your business model and revamp your product line to be desirable to the consumer.
2.) Leverage your current assets and purchase your competitors.
It looks like Harley has taken the latter to increase market share. But one thing they they are overlooking is brand name, for better or worse. Buy purchasing Ducati, they may actually harm the business more by attaching there name to it, even if they leave the business intact and operating separately. Consumer perceptions are the most fragile commodity in selling products.
Hey my softail makes 80hpand it's only 1690cc sooooo sad
Yea , But it does it with style!Hey my softail makes 80hp
Good point.... that's why a Buell/Harley pairing made sense, America and America. I don't see it working any other way. America/Italia.... hmm idk.... we'll see.
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