Bimota’s KB4 series might have been the most interesting machines at last month’s EICMA show in Milan, but the company isn’t planning to stop there, with neo-retro superbikes. Instead, Bimota’s big boss says his company plans to expand into the ADV and touring markets.
The remarks came in an interview with Brit bike mag MCN, as they covered EICMA (their story is here). Pierluigi Marconi , CEO of Bimota, told MCN that while the Italian boutique motorcycle manufacturer had focused on sporty machines in the past, it wanted to move towards adventure bikes and touring machines in the future; he teased a new machine debuting sometime in 2022 with hub steering(see rendering above), and another Bimota employee said this bike would have the same supercharged 197-horsepower motor as the Kawasaki H2 SX.
No surprise there, of course, as Bimota is now partially owned by Kawasaki, and the deal seems to offer a consistent pipeline of motors to the Italian company. It’s a big change for Bimota, who often relied on a supply of engines from other Euro manufacturers, and now has a steady backer that can reliably keep up to orders.
Just guessing, the machine in the photo above will be sort of an “adventure sports” bike, like Kawasaki’s Versys 1000: Made for pavement, but with ADV ergos. That’s where the market is headed, as far as sport-touring is concerned, and Bimota would undoubtedly gain hordes of drooling fans if it released such a bike in time for the EICMA show next fall.
