Thursday, September 6, 2007

TVS Flame provokes



Aren't we glad? I, for once, am surely. Many reasons:

1. This stunner comes from a company which has been known to launch relatively conservatively and shabbily designed bikes; of course Apache broke trend.

2. It induces Bajaj to file a court case for IPR infringement against TVS. Bajaj claims that the latter has used its patented DTSi technology. I am not happy that the launch of the bike has resulted in legal fights. What thrills me is the fact that these are two totally indigenous companies battling on technological issue while biggies of the world like Honda, Yamaha and Suzuki watch this from the sidelines. To me, it marks the coming of age of Indian auto companies. Certainly, we are in for some thrilling competition to capture the roads, to capture the pulse of biking.

3. TVS doesn't launch just this. It launches 7 products in one go. Certainly there would be many flames, not just among aficianados but also in the boardrooms of many a company in the industry. Bajaj was digging it in, TVS has started drilling in the earnest.

4. TVS surprised not just with the quality of designing but also with its muted pre-launch behaviour. The project, to me, seems more like a stealth project, though of course TVS had announced long time back - at the beginning of this year - that it's gonna launch a slew of products. It's quite unlike some other companies like Yamaha/Suzuki who've announced quite a bit but fall very very short of satisfying the excited Indian biker.

Flame comes fitted with a 125cc CC-VTI engine (well, you can read more on the site) . Generates 10.5bhp at 8250rpm. Don't want to comment about performance unless I ride it for a while. Looking at Apache RTR as a precedent, definitely this one's gonna be neat. Enjoy!