Chinese manufacturers are giving a new twist to a classic two-wheeler

Improvise. Adapt. Overcome. The famous, and often derided, Bear Grylls meme might often be overlooked by you and I whilst we scroll through our social media. However, it looks like Chinese two-wheel manufacturers have chosen it as their new mantra in their perpetual fight to dethrone Atlas Honda. 

Context is important, and the only context needed for the two-wheeler market is that Honda Atlas is essentially the market. However, where there’s money involved you cannot simply C'est La Vie. The smaller players have banded around what seems to be the newest tool in their arsenal to correct this imbalance, and that is the scooter. Or rather, the return of the scooter. And, with an electric twist this time around.  

Don’t believe us? Evee Bikes and Road Prince will be launching their electric scooters this month. Metro Motorbikes released theirs last month. Profit did a count, and we found there to be almost as many electric scooters as there were companies. 

Fun fact; surprisingly, the vast majority, but not all, claimed to be the first in Pakistan to have released them. 

However, there is one major player conspicuously missing in the list of companies that will be rolling these out: Atlas Honda. Why is this important? Because this looks like it might be a lifeline that the Chinese brands may have grabbed.  

What do we mean here? The Statista Global Consumer Survey (December, 2022) puts the gender breakdown of motorcycle owners in Pakistan at a split of 68:32 in favour of males. And, that is where we have our scooters. “There is a social change going on in Pakistan, people are now more accepting of women driving on their own. Cars, given their current prices, are not affordable for everyone. At the end of the day if a woman has to go to her workplace, or go to her college etc, and she doesn’t have the facility of a car, then the scooter is the next best option,” Muhammad Salman, Director of Sales and Marketing at Road Prince, tells Profit. 

All of this might sound rudimentary to anyone with an interest in the space. However, to those not in the know, and even some that are, there are a lot of questions that all of this raises. Firstly, Atlas Honda has badly beaten the rest of the industry and forced them to double down on a scooter when their energy could be better directed at trying to beat the CD-70 still. Why not just pursue the female market with conventional bikes? Is the stereotype genuine? Is ‘electric’ just a buzzword in this space or is there something more happening. Doubling down on electric scooters is a simple decision that somehow raises more questions than answers in a market that has been starving for something beyond the traditional CD-70. 

First things first, let’s look at the combatants that we have in the two-wheeler space to see why Chinese manufacturers are looking to innovate in the space.