India Kawasaki Motors slashes Ninja 650's price by Rs 40,000

India Kawasaki Motors (IKM) has revised the price of its midsized tourer, Ninja 650 by close to Rs 40,000 in order to mark the 120^th anniversary of its existence globally. Notably, Kawasaki Heavy Industries was founded in 1896 in Japan.

The model, which was originally priced at Rs 537,420 (ex-showroom Delhi), will now cost Rs 497,420 making it "more affordable and an attractive proposition for riders looking to transition to middleweight models,” quotes a company release.

The new price of Ninja 650 comes into effect on August 1 and is valid on models that were manufactured in 2015. Launched earlier in 2012, the Ninja 650 is powered by an able four-stroke, parallel-twin, liquid-cooled, 649cc engine, which churns out a peak power of close to 72bhp at 8500rpm and a peak torque of 64Nm at 7000rpm – reputable performance figures for any model of this engine configuration. The same engine also powers its naked sibling ER-6n, which was rolled out into the company showrooms in October 2014 based on encouraging response to the Ninja 650.

Reshuffling in senior management team

File photo of Shigeto Nishikawa at the launch of the Kawasaki Z250 in Pune two years ago
 

The company, which has been very aggressive in terms of new product launches over the recent years, has not launched any product so far this year. It had last launched the Versys 650 (third model in 650cc line-up), along with KLX 110 off-road child bike, in December 2015. CY2015 saw the company rolling out four new products for the India market including Versys 1000, Ninja H2, Versys 650 and KLX 110.

While in CY 2014 IKM had launched Z800, ER-6n and Z250; it had rolled out Ninja ZX-14R, Ninja ZX-10R, Ninja 1000 and Z 1000 models in CY 2013 as new products.

The company was also readying its first single-cylinder offering, Z250SL (four-stroke, liquid-cooled, 249cc) for its India launch. However, the project is understood to have been put on hold. A few sources associated with the company say that the recent changes in the senior management could be attributed to the expected delay in new product plans.

IKM’s spokesperson, Shigeto Nishikawa, who was also the deputy managing director at the company and was known for his aggressive product planning for the India market, is understood to have moved out of India-role early this year.

Yoshitaka Tamura, who is understood to have served Kawasaki’s local arm until last year as the managing director, is now replaced by Yutaka Yamashita.

Yamashita is understood to have taken over the role of MD in India around the first quarter of CY 2016.

The company has a network of 12 standalone showrooms with the last store opening in Coimbatore in April 2016. IKM sells a total of 12 motorcycles in India along with one model for children. Among all models currently sold in India, it locally assembles five motorcycles (Ninja 650, Ninja 300, ER-6n, Versys 650 and Z250) and imports the remaining as completely built units (CBUs).