The country’s largest two-wheeler maker Hero MotoCorp has planned to launch at least five new models during this fiscal. It has also lined up a capex of ₹2,500 crore for the next couple of years to support its capacity expansion plans.

The company is preparing to launch three new motorcycles — Xtreme, Xpulse and a 125 cc refresh of Glamour. It will also introduce two new scooters, Duet and Maestro Edge, in 125 cc versions, the company management told an investors’ conference call.

Renewed strategy

The proposed launches in the bike segment signal the company’s strategy of growing its presence in the higher CC segments of the motorcycle market.

Hero’s sales in the above-125cc segments are poor.

In FY18, the company’s volumes fell to 71,278 units from 98,008 units in FY17 in the 125-150cc category. But Hero continues to dominate the sub-125 cc bike market.

Its domestic rivals TVS and Bajaj have already made strong inroads into the higher CC bike segments.

However, Hero managed to maintain its domestic motorcycle market share at about 51.5 per cent in FY18, helped by strong volume growth in HF Deluxe, Splendor Plus and Glamour.

Its proposed scooter launches are also aimed at tapping the growing momentum in the 125 cc segment.

Market share

The new launches are to come at a time when Hero has recovered market share in the scooter segment (13.8 per cent in the fourth quarter of FY18 against 12.7 per cent in Q4 of FY17). Hero is the third big player in scooters after TVS (which had a market share of 16.8 per cent in Q4FY18) and Honda (55.7 per cent share).

With the new launches, the company hopes to gain market share by being present in more two-wheeler segments.

Hero expects the momentum in the two-wheeler industry to continue and hopes to register higher-than-industry growth. The industry is likely to log double-digit growth this fiscal.

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