30% rise in two-wheeler exports in H1

According to the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM) data, the total two-wheeler exports reported a 30 per cent increase with 12,36,384 units between January and April.

The exports of two-wheelers between January and April in 2023 were 9,58,951 units. “The uptick in the export demand seen over the last couple of months of fiscal 2024 is backed by a slight recovery and stabilization of the environment in a few of these regions, as well as a slight moderation in oil prices. Recovery, however, appears fragile and sustainability of the same is yet to be established. Earlier, exports to these regions had been impacted by consumer price inflation, high interest rates and foreign currency-related issues in fiscals 2022 and 2023. During this period, consumers in these markets switched to used vehicles or deferred purchases,” said Anuj Sethi, Senior Director of CRISIL Ratings Ltd.

With two-wheeler exports from India largely targeted in countries including Columbia, Nigeria, Philippines, Mexico, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Egypt and Nepal two-wheeler Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEM) are looking for new markets.

“The macroeconomic and geopolitical issues continue to be a challenge, though the number of markets severely affected has been reducing. We have divided the overseas markets into three sets: Stressed markets, which are now Nigeria, Bangladesh, Kenya, Egypt, and Argentina; second, the recovering markets, which are mostly the balance markets; and thirdly, the new markets, which are a group of new territories and new segments in existing markets where we are going to enter or have recently entered,” said Rakesh Sharma, Executive Director of Bajaj Auto Limited.

The production of two-wheelers also saw an uptick with an average 20 per cent increase between January and April. 74,57,879 two-wheelers were produced between January and April as compared to 59,47,723 units produced during the same period in 2023.

“We have changed distributors in a couple of markets, like you saw in Nepal. We expect Mexico to move up, recent there was a change in the distributor in Nigeria as well. So, all of this augurs well for the FY25. However, I refrain from giving any guidance on next year’s volume. In fact, there are more market entries you would have seen from our announcement today, which is that we have approved forming a subsidiary in Brazil, which we have already talked about earlier in the Philippines. So, there will be some of these bigger markets, so we are getting into some big markets where we are changing the distributors which we have changed, and even on the product portfolio part of it there is a bit of change that is happening in terms of putting these in the market. Moving forward the quarters and the years, our international business will be building up,” Niranjan Gupta, Chief Executive Officer of Hero MotoCorp Limited said during the earnings call.