Bimota puts the key under the door…

It is now certain: the Italian Bimota, riddled with debt, goes out of business. His disappearance, confirmed by the Italian courts, is notably linked to a failed sponsorship during the Superbike 2000. Chronicle of an announced death…

After 27 years of existence, the Italian motorcycle will now have to count without Bimota, which definitively closes its factory following a court decision … Riddled with debt, dropped by its possible buyers – including the American importer MotoPoint and a mysterious consortium of French companies -, the constructor "deliberately elitist"will not go up the slope.

Asked by Moto-Net, the French importer Bimota Robert Gelain admits "have tears in my eyes. Alas, I hardly believe in a favorable outcome anymore", he confides. The solution of the takeover by the 50 employees of the firm, in the form of a cooperative, indeed seems difficult to viable because of the sums involved: before their withdrawal, the buyers were talking about aligning nearly 15 billion lire, or about 50 million FF…

This disastrous financial situation finds its source in particular during the Superbike 2000: following a disagreement between the sponsors – West cigarettes, the jeans manufacturer Levi’s (the Bimota in the race did not have the number 501 by chance), Virginio Ferrari Racing (VFR ) and the Nigerian Prince Malik Ado Ibrahim -, the Rimini firm had finally had to fully self-finance the competition, or several million heavy francs on its own…

What greatly breaks the kidneys of this almost artisanal manufacturer, in whom each motorcycle was manufactured from A to Z by one of the twelve assemblers and not on an anonymous assembly line. Certainly, the sales figures of Bimota would gently smile the Japanese monsters: 39 registrations in France between September 1999 and July 2000 and about 800 per year worldwide….

But Bimota mainly based its financing on subcontracting: the Rimini plant had notably manufactured the Ducati MH 900, and was also to build the Italjet motorcycle. However, the legendary brand could still be bought and used by another motorcycle manufacturer, so as not to disappear forever into the oblivion of history. "It would be the fairytale version of this sad ending", considers, without much hope, the disappointed lover Robert Gelain…

Eric MICHEL

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