KARACHI: A recent decision of three local assemblers of Japanese motorcycles to reduce prices on different models by up to seven percent has affected the sales of Chinese motorbikes, which have decline by around 40 percent in the past month.
Motorcycles dealers said the recent reduction in prices affected demand for Chinese motorcycles and added that there is almost 40 percent decline in the sales Chinese bikes following the reduction in prices last month.
Dealers of Chinese bikes at Akbar Road say that they have stopped imports for some time as deals for already available products in their showrooms have been halted for the last one month.
“Normally the market receives 15 to 20 customers of Chinese bikes every day,” said Irfan Baig one of the importers of Chinese bikes at Akbar Road. “But for the last two weeks, I have not registered any deal for Chinese bike.”
He said due to prices cut in Japanese products, people do not prefer Chinese bikes and situation has hit business of Chinese bike dealers all over the country.
“Chinese bikes are used to sell maximum at Rs 40,000 but you would not get more than 70cc variety,” said Muhammad Sabir Sheikh, chairman All Pakistan Motorcycles Dealers Association.
“The only other variety is 125cc motorcycle, which is available in Chinese brand at Rs 55,000 but it is not popular.”
He cited recent data complied by his association and said in the last one month a total of 6,000 Chinese bikes have been sold, which normally crossed 10,000 mark before prices cut by Japanese assemblers. “So you can say that sales of Chinese bikes have witnessed almost 40 percent decline,” said Mr Sheikh. “But it would go further down, if prices are reduced further.”
Rising production, sales: “The reason of cut in the prices is simply rising volume,” said Kunwar Idrees, chairman Pakistan Automotive Manufacturers Association (PAMA). “Assemblers who once used to sell 100,000 bikes in a year are now heading towards half a million mark.”
But he admitted competition emerged after the entrance of Chinese products has also pushed these assemblers to cut prices to attract buyers’ attention.
The three leading motorcycle including Atlas Honda Limited, Dawood Yamaha Limited and Suzuki Motorcycle Pakistan Limited cut prices on their models by Rs 2,000 to Rs 4,000 per unit.
Prices of CD-70 and CG-125 - most popular motorcycle categories of Atlas Honda Limited - were cut by Rs 4,000 and Rs 2,000 and now these two models are tagged at Rs 54,000 per unit and Rs 71,000 per unit, respectively.
Similarly, prices of all motorcycles assembled by Dawood Yamaha including 80cc and 100cc have been reduced by Rs 2,000 to Rs 3,000.
Assemblers say the trend would continue in future as rising demand and increasing production volume of Japanese motorcycles have grown by almost 100 percent in the last one and a half year.
“Reduction in prices depends on rising demand and increase of volume,” said Mr Idrees of PAMA. “And as both elements are growing day by day, the trend of declining prices would continue in future.”
Production and sales of motorcycles of three major assemblers of Japanese motorcycles topped August’s auto sales figures. The production of Japanese motorcycles recorded at 31,426 units out of which a total of 31,128 units were sold.
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