The hot gossip in the last few days is that Indian motorcycle manufacturer Hero is about to buy the entirety of bankrupt Erik Buell Racing. That’s not entirely true, but they are working on a deal to re-acquire some assets.
Hero owned over 49 per cent of EBR, and had the American sportbike manufacturer working on several designs for them. The most famous of these was probably the HX250R, an entry-level 250 that was hyped with specs that far outstripped anything else in the quarter-litre market.
Given EBR’s demise, Hero was no doubt worried about where those plans would end up. As a result, they’ve been putting together a plan to buy up the designs EBR was working. According to the Bombay Stock Exchange, Hero has agreed to drop any financial claims against EBR in exchange for getting assets, tangible and intangible, that come from EBR’s consulting business.
This is good news. It means we might actually see some of that EBR technology hit the market yet, although Hero is certainly taking their time in coming to North America. It also casts serious doubt on the rumour that Hero is buying the entirety of EBR. That may still be possible, but if it was true, why would they drop $2.8 million now, when they could just get all the company’s assets in one fell swoop?
[…] Buell Motorcycles, announced it it was going into receivership in April. Since then, part owner Hero paid $2.8 million for design and consultation work that Buell had been developing for them, and the rest of the company was sold at auction […]