Rennie Scaysbrook | April 20, 2020
TVS Motors buys Norton Motorcycles for $19.98 million. Indian’s third-largest motorcycle manufacturer, TVS is more famed for scooters, mopeds and a small capacity naked bike and sport bike line up, with most its products sold into the Indian and South East Asia markets.
Norton has been saved from the abyss and is now under the control of India’s TVS Motors.
“Norton presents us with an immense opportunity to scale globally,” said TVS’s joint managing director Sudarshan Venu told Reuters, saying his firm would provide “full support for Norton to regain its full glory”.
Norton Motorcycles has endured a stunning fall from grace under the leadership of CEO entrepreneur Stuart Garner, when the company was put into administration on January 30. The insolvency process was triggered earlier when Norton was taken to court by UK tax authorities HMRC for payment of GBP 300,000 ($386,737) in outstanding taxes.
Stuart Garner is understood to have personally owned 86 percent of Norton Motorcycles’ equity, with the balance held by three longtime friends of his, each with a small single-digit percentage shareholding. In recent years, Norton has focused on developing the V4 RR sport bike range, with which it returned to the Isle of Man TT with Australian riders Cameron Donald, Josh Brookes, and David Johnson.
The acquisition of Norton Motorcycles puts TVS into line with fellow Indian brands such as Hero Motor Corp and Bajaj Auto, who each own shares in mainstream motorcycle companies in Triumph and KTM. Previously, TVS Motors manufactured the BMW G 310 GS and G 310 street bikes on the German company’s behalf.
TVS Motors has said it will start investing in the further development of the Commando, Dominator, and V4 RR lines, and will move forward with the 650 Atlas Nomad and Ranger models (that use a Chinese-built Zongshen parallel-twin motor) which have already been developed under Garner’s lead.
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