India Kawasaki slashes Rs 50,000 off its Z800

An official communication from India Kawasaki Motors (IKM) states that the company has slashed the price of its mid-sized naked bike Z800 by Rs 50,000 till March 31, 2015. The model will now sport an ex-showroom price of Rs 735,000 (Pune) as against Rs 790,000 (ex-showroom, Pune) and Rs 8.05 lakh (ex-showroom, Delhi) at the time of its launch in January 2014.

This comes at a time when the government authorities have removed the excise duty benefits on passenger cars and motorcycles from January 1, 2015. However, the price reduction on this model is due to the cost savings achieved at Kawasaki’s Thailand plant, where Z800s are produced.

The company statement states that “the ex-showroom price reduction of the Z800 may be a bit more (over Rs 50,000) depending on local taxation (across states). The cost reduction happened mainly in Thailand where Z800 is manufactured. This is done by Kawasaki, and is being forwarded to its customers. Other models which are manufactured in Japan are ruled out (of the price reduction) this time.”

The 231kg (kerb weight) Z800 model, which is a high performance bike for its class, is powered by a liquid-cooled, four-stroke, in-line four cylinder 806cc engine mated to a six-speed transmission. The engine develops maximum power of 113bhp at 10,200rpm.

It is to be noted that the Z800 models are imported from Thailand as completely built units (CBUs) and are sold in the Indian market. Further, the company has been receiving a number of requests for working out a local assembly plan for this popular model (Z800) at Bajaj Auto’s Akurdi facility, where it locally assembles four models currently – Z250, Ninja 300, Ninja 650 and ER-6n.

While talking to Autocar Professional recently, Shigeto Nishikawa, deputy managing director, India Kawasaki Motors, had disclosed that the company had plans to sell 200 units of the Z800 model in 2014, and was aiming for total sales of close to 1,800-2,000 units for last year.

IKM is known to have been aggressively working on increasing the rate of local content and the Z250, which is also made in Thailand, is the latest example. The model has a localisation rate of 40 percent on its assembly line.