Delivery bottlenecks for new motorcycles

Posted on by admin

Table of contents

Delivery bottlenecks for new motorcycles
imago images / MiS

counselor

traffic & business

Delivery bottlenecks for new motorcycles

Delivery bottlenecks for new motorcycles
Readers experience asked: Do you have to wait too??

There are currently many reasons for delays in delivering motorcycles and spare parts: the aftermath of the corona lockdowns, an accident in the Suez Canal, slow customs clearance between Great Britain and the EU and production bottlenecks due to a lack of semiconductors. What experiences have you done?


Dina Dervisevic

07/06/2021

In this article:

  • Delay due to Euro 5
  • Customs clearance UK – EU
  • Bottleneck due to lack of semiconductors
  • Logistics and Suez Canal
  • Sold out or new models
  • Conclusion

Whether it’s a model change in the course of the Euro 5 standard, missing semiconductors, shipping containers that are too expensive and too rare or the Suez Canal that has been closed for days – the reasons for possible delivery bottlenecks are currently as numerous as understandable. We are interested in:

  • What experiences have you done?
  • Who of you is waiting for an ordered motorcycle (make / model) or spare parts and for how long?
  • What do your motorcycle dealers say about it?

Write to us brigitte@motorradonline.de

In the following we explain the individual causes:

Delay due to Euro 5

Due to the Euro 5 model change, there may be delays of a few weeks or a few months for individual models, such as the Yamaha MT-09. It should have been at the dealers in March and will not come until April / May. Most of the other Yamaha Euro 5 motorcycles are already at dealerships or were sold last year.

If there are occasional delivery times that are delayed by a few weeks, this does not always have something to do with the pandemic. “We are dealing here with a Euro 5 model change and in some cases completely new models, so a few weeks of delays are nothing unusual. That has already happened in recent years with the introduction of new models – not only at Yamaha.”, so the feedback from a Yamaha dealer.

Customs clearance UK – EU

At Triumph, for example, there may currently be slight delays in delivery due to the not yet completely smooth customs clearance from Great Britain to the EU. “There are delivery bottlenecks neither with our motorcycles nor with spare parts.”, the British manufacturer assures us.

Bottleneck due to lack of semiconductors

Eric de Seynes, President and CEO of Yamaha Motor Europe explains in a video that the effects of the corona pandemic on the supply chains are more sustainable than previously assumed. Not all products could therefore be made available in sufficient quantities at the beginning of the 2021 motorcycle season. One cause has to do with the availability of raw materials for semiconductors (chips) and semiconductor manufacturing. These semiconductors are, for example, indispensable for smart keys, ABS brake systems, control units, etc. The current demand for semiconductors is so high that many manufacturers and suppliers in all industries have to repeatedly take production breaks because the chips are missing.

Background 1: Due to the effects of the pandemic, many more products that rely on semiconductors have been and are being sold (e.g. laptops and game consoles).

Background 2: Due to the tense and indeterminate situation in 2020 and the resulting fear of excessively high inventories, manufacturers and suppliers noticeably cut orders and can therefore not fall back on stocks today.

Logistics and Suez Canal

The logistics between Asia and Europe is currently another bottleneck in the supply chains. Since the container ships are currently well booked or fully booked, freight spaces are rare and expensive. This is why, for example, some Honda dealers do not have as many models in stock as they would like. The demand is great, but the shipping of the motorcycles is not going according to plan, according to a dealer. Like most motorcycle manufacturers, Honda also produces some models in Europe (Italy and Spain), so that dealers in this country are not only dependent on models from Asia.

In addition to the already tense container situation, the wrecked Ever Given came at the end of March 2021. The container ship blocked the Suez Canal for days. This exacerbated the situation around the already rare and currently very expensive container spaces. The ship also had several thousand Yamaha parts on board, as Eric de Seynes, President and CEO of Yamaha Motor Europe explained in his video statement.

Because of the Suez Canal blockade and its consequences, the delivery of the new Suzuki Hayabusa will probably be delayed by a few weeks, among other things. It was planned that the model would arrive in sufficient quantities at the dealerships in early April. “As far as the availability of spare parts and accessories is concerned, there are currently no longer delivery times or inventory bottlenecks.”, so the feedback from Suzuki on the question of the spare parts location.

According to its own statements, Kawasaki is also affected by the unstable logistics situation in the world economy, keyword container availability. “However, the situation in our supply chain is still stable. We do not expect any availability problems in the area of ​​spare parts.”, says Jurgen Hopker-Seibert, the deputy Kawasaki branch manager. He also informed us that due to the very good demand, the total contingent for the 2021 model year had already been pre-ordered by Kawasaki dealers. Unfortunately, short-term increases in production are not possible.

Sold out or new models

Sure, if you want to buy a model from a dealer you trust that is already sold out on site, you can wait a few months, possibly until the middle of 2021. Or he or she contacts a dealer who still has the model in stock Has. However, this is not something that we have only known since the pandemic, but rather common in individual cases.

According to Suzuki, for example, the Suzuki dealers already have enough models. And if a desired color should not be available on site, Suzuki will provide the desired machine at short notice from the dealer network. “As planned, our new Hayabusa will also arrive in sufficient quantities at our authorized dealers at the beginning of April.”

Conclusion

Sometimes it all comes together. As if a pandemic and the space on the container ships, which has become scarce due to the effects, were not a logistical challenge enough, a container ship blocks the Suez Canal for days. And for the motorcycle manufacturers, the change to Euro 5 is an additional factor. New models and model changes have often been accompanied by delays in the past. Currently, only those who pick out a model that the dealer already has in the halls have 100 percent no waiting time.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *