A Cult Motorcycle From India Takes On the World

The Royal Enfield Motors factory in Chennai, India. The brand sold nearly 175,000 motorcycles in 2013.
By SAMANTH SUBRAMANIAN
Published: January 3, 2014

NEW DELHI, India — The Royal Enfield Bullet, often described as the oldest continuously produced motorcycle in the world, is a cult product for enthusiasts who love it for its vintage feel as much as for the thrum of its engine.
Muscular and pliant, the Bullet — an Indian-made avatar of an old British brand — has found renewed popularity over the last few years, as leisure motorcycling in India has blossomed. Its manufacturer, Royal Enfield Motors, sold almost 175,000 motorcycles —Bullets as well as three other brands — in 2013.
The company is now looking to push harder into British and American markets, hoping to follow in the wake of other Indian motor vehicle manufacturers that have competed hard with overseas brands even as their peers in other industries have struggled.
Royal Enfield’s newest model, a midsize “cafe racer” called the Continental GT, was introduced at an elaborate event in London in September. “It’s the first bike that we’ve developed keeping the world market in mind,” said Siddhartha Lal, who is credited with turning Royal Enfield around.
Mr. Lal, age 40, is the chief executive of Eicher Motors, a manufacturer of buses, trucks and tractors that owns Royal Enfield. Uncommonly for an Indian executive, he sports sideburns and wears jeans and a bomber jacket to meetings. He was riding a Bullet when he was in university, well before Eicher, under his father’s management, bought Royal Enfield in 1993.
The sale price was “just pennies,” Mr. Lal said. Eicher reported revenue of more than $1 billion in 2012.
The Bullet was first produced by a British firm named Royal Enfield, but after that company shut down in 1971, its Indian