Just watched the Sprint Race in Thailand. What an opportunity for a factory to pick up the KTM race team, with the favoured V4 engine format, for 2026.
Looks like €2bn of debt took a 70% haircut, which should stabilise the balance sheet. KTM are not out of the woods yet. Stock overhang has to be sold assuming customers are willing, then production must be re-started to keep the 2000 employees busy.
It has been made to sound positive..But just look at all of the unsold stock at dealers and in warehouses. With a lot of the old spec 1290 engine around. A mountain to climb imo. Sell old stock, who wants it? convince punters to buy the latest models. How? Price, guarantee (what flippin guarantee if they are not solvent?) improved quality and reliability..BUT nothing has changed..sorry, as a KTM owner I see it as at best a 50/50 chance going forward and think anyone buying one is mad. When you say stabilise, you mean some debt has been written off. The stable part is a long, long way off. If ever.
From what I gather the RC390 is stock at 43hp. so without speeding a fortune -maybe max 50-55? Its not enough for me to ditch my old NC30. The KTM690 is the same weight too, so clearly KTM could have made a much better bike -imo It looks good to me, handling is allegedly good too, though some reports say the gearbox is prone to faults & jumping out?
Other way around AFAIK? The RC390 Cup spec races were on a broadly the same bike with the road gear removed, the brakes beefed up and a little less power.
This is an interesting -though expensive- variation https://www.motorcyclespecs.co.za/model/Custom/ktm_rc4_690r.htm
Interesting take on the situation here, smacks a bit of the Norton debacle. https://x.com/dario_dewet/status/1896621602999316927?s=46&t=hTSgVSojklPZkVc-BsRiWA
I wouldn’t take too much of what influencers on the internet say as gospel. They are there to make money from hits, not tell the truth.
Exactly, without demand for the product then they are just rearranging the deckchairs. Like I said - buy one get one free - before it gets to be - buy one get two free !
Took my 1290 Super Duke to Drysdales on Tuesday. They were advertising an ex demo 1390 Super Duke with under 1000 miles for £11k so asked if it was still available and was told they had 3 of them for sale and they all sold last week. Dealer told me they're not worried about the situation at KTM
That is interesting and good news. I just quickly had a look on CoPilot and the "AI" answer was this that KTM had 265,000 unsold bikes. By comparison Triumph have just had an excellent record-breaking year in 2024, selling a total of 134,635 bikes. Personally, I would buy another Triumph before I bought another KTM.
