In Conversation With Ducati India’s Bipul Chandra

Ducati has had a stellar 2021. Not only did the Italian firm outdid its 2020 sales, which were largely affected due to COVID-19, but also sales made in 2019 by 12 percent. India has played a small but key role in this growth, with the likes of the Scramblers, Multistradas and more recently the Monster helping the Italian marque’s positive growth. So, we got a chance to sit down with Ducati India’s Bipul Chandra to know the road ahead for Ducati India in 2022.

Ducati’s 2021 Performance
BC: 2021 was very good, very interesting. The denominator was less in 2020, so the percentage (growth) was very high. But despite that handicap, if we have shown growth, we have reason to celebrate. Interestingly, although the Scrambler was the most selling (Ducati) bike, which is needless to say, the overall percentage of Scramblers sold has gone down a bit and the bigger bikes have gone up. Multistradas have sold like hot cakes. The Monster, despite it arriving so late in India, we have done brilliantly well with that bike. What astonished us was the Streetfighter V4, because of perhaps its variety of usage.

Plans For 2022
BC: Now, we had already announced that we would be launching 11 bikes this year. We have launched the Scrambler 1100 Tribute Pro today (interviewed after the launch of the bike), and the Panigale V2 Troy Bayliss edition is soon to arrive.

We aren’t banking on the Desert X too much this year, even if there is a lot of hype around the bike. The bike will probably arrive in India at the end of the year. The bike will be launched now in the global markets, so in India it will be launched after around six months. So, the tentative time frame for the Desert X is Nov-Dec 2022.

The model year 2022 update of the Panigale V4 is going to play a key role for us in India. Although that’s not going to be a volume pusher but as a halo product, we are definitely looking at that bike (to do well) and it is going to be pretty amazing.

Amongst the newer bikes, we are pretty keen on the Streetfighter V2 and Multistrada V2 to be key players for us, this year. Our main aim is to showcase to our customers the differences between our V2s and V4s. Besides the air-cooled Scramblers and the Monster, which are icons in their own regards, our three biggest bike families have got a V2 and V4 version. So, while the Multistrada V2 will carry forward the good vibes of the Multistrada 950, the Streetfighter V2 will be a very interesting bike. The Streetfighter V2 will be for someone who will look at getting something that’s more aggressive and engaging to ride than the Monster.

DRE Tours And Trackdays Are Coming Back
BC: We had plans to have tours last year as well but you know how the situation panned out (with COVID-19). This year, we have a few tours planned. If weather permits, we should have undertaken our ride to Rajasthan pretty soon. So, in 2022, we will have trips back in plan.