Siddhartha Lal on the Royal Enfield Pegasus Classic 500
We caught up with Siddhartha Lal, CEO and MD, Eicher Motors at the unveiling of the limited edition Royal Enfield Classic 500 Pegasus in the UK. We spoke to him about the new motorcycle, the part history plays for the Royal Enfield brand and also Eicher Motors' strategy going forward. Read on to know what he said
Interviewer: Could you give us a brief idea of why you went for the Pegasus name, a lot of history behind it?
Siddhartha Lal: We've been studying the history of Royal Enfield and, of course, we've always known about the Flying Flea, which was this, light and rugged and durable 125cc motorcycle. But when we got into the entire story of how it evolved, the idea behind it and the interesting bits about it, we decided to come out with a limited edition which is the Classic 500 Pegasus. Pegasus is this logo here, of the airborne regiment and the Flying Flea was the only motorcycle that was being used in these kinds of situations, in WWII, so we've recreated that entire history in this motorcycle here.
Int: Are there any other plans for more such special editions influenced by your back-catalogue? Because you are focusing these days primarily on the history of the brand.
Lal: Of course, Royal Enfield has a long history, we are the oldest motorcycle company in continuous production since 1901. And there are lots of stories to tell, so this is, of course, a very distinct story we believe, of the Flying Flea, Pegasus and therefore of this motorcycle. But also we take a lot of inspiration from our history. We also had our Donair collection a couple of years ago which celebrated the dispatch riders. We also take that into account in the Interceptor and the Continental GT, the twins that are coming out later in the year. They're also inspired from our history, so our history is an important part of our storytelling and whatever we are doing in our future.
Int: How many of these Pegasus motorcycles will be available for the Indian market?
Lal: Classic Pegasus 500, we're going to have 1000 of these, as a limited edition, available worldwide, of which around 250 for India. So that's a fourth of all of our motorcycles.
Int: You recently said that the Eicher group will focus primarily on Royal Enfield. Does this mean that the group is not looking for any further M&As?
Lal: We've decided we want to put all of our future energies behind motorcycles at Eicher Motors. And, of course, continue with our extremely strong JV with Volvo in commercial vehicles. It's more about focus for the company, where we are not looking at getting into other categories of vehicles altogether.
See the interview below