Audi buy Ducati
Last month we reported that Audi has entered in to an exclusive agreement to buy Ducati, pipping Mercedes to the trophy super bike maker and adding a trophy to its cabinet. And the deal is now done.
Audi aren’t saying what they’ve paid for Ducati but it appears to be somewhere around £700 million, which includes debt of around £120 million.
Ducati has been quietly on the market for some time – in fact probably since it was bought by Investindustrial back in 2008 – and the recent tie-up between Ducati and Mercedes looked like a prelude to a sale. But Audi has trumped Mercedes and bought themselves a trophy super bike maker.
With sales of around 40,000 bikes a year and profits of about £75 million (before stuff like interest and depreciation) Ducatti isn’t a bad buy, but is it anything more than a trophy for Audi; a way of sticking two fingers up to BMW and Mercedes? On the face of it, perhaps not. But there is probably real value beyond the bike sales.
Ducati has some stunning engines in its stable and are real experts in extracting lots of power from lightweight engines. That technology wouldn’t have had much relevance to car makers a few years ago, but with engine downsizing the way forward Ducati’s expertise is sure to find a home in future Audis, either as independent power sources or as range-extenders.
And that – beyond the trophy of another Italian super-brand – is where the real value probably lies for Audi.
Have your say - leave a comment