According to figures released by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics the imports of semi and completely knocked down kits have dropped in the last six months. Atlas Honda has been breaking sales records for the last few months on a frequent basis. And it isn’t like Atlas Honda is the only bike manufacturer in Pakistani market on the path to set new standards. United Motorcycles, the leading Chinese Bike manufacturing company in Pakistan has been following suit of Atlas Honda.
For Sale on Pakwheels: Motorcycle
Atlas Honda made record sales in the month of December 2016 by selling off 84,137 units. Interestingly, the company managed to sell 458,695 units in July-December; considerable improvement of 16.8pc in terms of year over year growth. United motorcycles, however, sold 161,828 units in the last six months, up 33.2pc from a year ago.
The increased localisation of parts has delivered a massive blow to the kit imports from China, Japan and Thailand. APMA (Association of Pakistan Motorcycle Assemblers) Chairman M. Sabir Shaikh indicated that the localisation of parts could have contributed in the slowdown of kit imports in the country, but it could not make such a big impact in the six-month importing figure. He remarked that invoicing scams , mis-declaration and smuggling are the main contributors for this sudden drop in the import figures. The government needs to take radical steps to revise the import taxes and valuation rates to curb the menace of auto-parts smuggling.
He said Chinese bike assemblers have become victims of intense competition among themselves. Twenty-six out of 125 assemblers showed zero production in 2015-16 while 32 assemblers shut down their plants. Yet 67 units managed to assemble 2.058m bikes in 2015-16.
In 2015-16, the import bill of CKD/SKD kits went up 4pc to $94m on a year-on-year basis.
In July-Dec, Yamaha`s production fell 60.6pc to 5,000 units from a year ago. However, the production of Suzuki bikes grew 18.4pc to 9,952 units over the same period.
(This news was originally published on Dawn)
