By IANS,
Chennai : Japanese bike maker Yamaha is looking to regain lost ground in the highly-competitive Indian two-wheeler market with the brand new Sports bike YZF-R15.
India Yamaha Motor Pvt Ltd hopes the stylish 150 cc high-end bike will take head on Hero Honda’s Karizma, Bajaj Pulsar 220 DTS-FI and TVS Apache RTR.
The company is aggressively promoting YZF-R15, which will come with a price tag of nearly Rs.100,000, and is targeting a sale of 25,000 units between now and December.
“We will start a new era of Yamaha India with this bike,” Yamaha India chief executive and managing director Tsutomu Mabuchi told IANS on the commercial launch of the vehicle here this weekend. “This model is extremely important to us. It is one of the most technologically advanced bikes in India and will be a starting point for us.”
Describing India as an “extremely important market”, Mabuchi said Yamaha is “re-emerging” in India and the YZF R15 would provide customers with the best of biking technologies.
“We gave a lot of thought before launching this bike. We had a close look at the market and we reconsidered our approach. We found that that this segment is our best area to attack,” Mabuchi said.
YZF-R15′ has the looks of the Yamaha R1 superbike model and comes in two colours – racing blue and black. Its power unit is a liquid-cooled, four-stroke single cylinder four-valve fuel injected engine. The YZF-R15 will be the first motorcycle in India with six gears after the old Yamaha RD 350.
“This bike looks very racy but actually anyone can drive this bike,” Mabuchi said.
The company launched a series of events with test rides and lottery draws over the weekend at the Madras Motor Sports Club on the outskirts of the city.
“We are overwhelmed by the response of the people. Chennai has alone registered 500 bookings for the bike,” said Pankaj Dubey, division head, sales and marketing.