Eric Buell Racing and Hero MotoCorp’s collaboration had given a big ray of hope to Hero’s fans after their split with Honda and their technical support. We saw the first hints of EBR on the new 2014 Karizma twins but, more than that the upcoming products were surprisingly promising! At the last Auto Expo in Delhi, Hero stole the show with their 38Nm turbocharged diesel TnT, 31PS HX250R and the sexy Hastur concept among others.
However, in a very unpleasant move, Eric Buell Racing filed for bankruptcy under Chapter 128 last week to protect itself from its creditors. They have outstanding liabilities worth 20 million dollars. Eric Buell, the man behind the show, in a very emotional post on EBR’s official Facebook page shares that they tried to do too much with too little funding. He also revealed…
“While at the same time doing revolutionary work for Hero on the HX250R, Leap, SimplEcity, iON, RnT and many others, plus concepts never publicly seen. It was great EBR innovation and design, and introduced new technology to Hero and its suppliers to provide a real kick start for them.”
It is widely known that Hero doesn’t have a very deep R&D at the moment and the cash-rich company desperately need/needed someone to help them sustain their momentum.
The game for Hero was to begin with their new models which were heavily based on the technical help and support of EBR. What will happen to them?
We repeat, this is a blow to Hero as well and their upcoming products like HX250R and others may get delayed, if not completely shelved! EBR was to distribute Hero branded motorcycles in the USA but when and how will they get to see the American market now can not be predicted at the moment…
Hero has recently opened a new facility with Magneti Marelli to produce fuel injection systems and ride by wire tech for its products, and there is a good possibility that it was EBR which introduced them to such technologies!
