Yamaha Motor to Export to Europe From India as Local Sales Fall

Yamaha Motor Co., the world's second- largest motorcycle maker, will start exporting to Europe from India as it seeks to end losses at its south Asian unit.
Yamaha will begin selling Indian-made motorcycles in Europe as early as next year, President Takashi Kajikawa said in an interview yesterday. The Indian unit has posted losses since 2001, including an operating loss of 8.8 billion yen ($85 million) last year.
The company's sales in India plunged 48 percent last year as it lost customers to Hero Honda Motors Ltd.'s Splendor and Hunk models. The Iwata City-Japan based company is only using 33 percent of its manufacturing capacity in India.

``Yamaha is bleeding in India and its losses will just expand, if it does nothing,'' said Koji Endo, a senior analyst at Credit Suisse Group, in Tokyo. ``It has to increase operation rates and to do so, exports make sense.''
Yamaha Motor India Pvt.'s motorcycle sales fell to 120,000 units last year from 230,000 in 2006, the company said. For help, Yamaha has turned to Mitsui & Co., Japan's second-largest trading company, to use its sales network in India. Exports in that period declined 4.9 percent to 52,024.