Chinese manufacturer warned 2027 MotoGP entry would be “madness”
The 2027 MotoGP entry of one Chinese manufacturer would be “madness” according to one paddock insider.
A team owner in the MotoGP paddock thinks it would be “madness” for one Chinese manufacturer to enter the premier class of grand prix racing in 2026.
The manufacturer in question is CFMoto, for whom a step into the premier class with its own machinery in 2027 would be too soon in the opinion of Jorge Martinez ‘Aspar’.
“No, it's too close,” he told Spanish publication Motosan. “The only way to get to 2027 would be to be inside an existing manufacturer.”
CFMoto factory has been linked with the Valencia-based Aspar Team, owned by Martinez, since 2023. It’s a partnership that saw a CFMoto-branded KTM Moto3 bike win the lightweight class title in 2024 with David Alonso.
Alonso stepped up to Moto2 last year with Aspar and won a race in his rookie season, while his teammate, fellow rookie Dani Holgado, won twice. In Moto3, Max Quiles has taken over the mantle from Alonso at the CFMoto-backed team, winning three races and finishing third in the standings in a debut season that saw him miss four races for a combination of age restrictions and injuries.
The CFMoto-Aspar partnership has been a successful one so far, and it enters the 2026 season with legitimate possibilities to win both the Moto3 and Moto2 title.
But stepping into MotoGP isn’t something that can be rushed, the Valencian team’s owner thinks.
“Obviously their idea in the future would be to reach MotoGP,” Martinez said, “but I think there is time for all that, unless they finally reach an agreement with a powerful MotoGP manufacturer. Then everything would be faster and easier.
“I think we have to continue in the line that is going now.”
In the past, Aspar itself existed in MotoGP, running satellite Ducatis until 2018, after spells with Open class Honda machinery and CRT Aprilias.
The Spanish squad could theoretically move back into the premier class with CFMoto, although it would need to acquire the grid slots held by one of the current 11 teams to do so given the championship’s current reluctance to expand the grid beyond 22 bikes.
But moving in 2027 would not be logistically possible for Aspar, even if CFMoto were keen to make the step, Martinez says: “We have to be realistic, we are in 2026, and we have already set up and done all of 2026. Setting up the infrastructure for 2027 would be madness.
“I think we have to go step-by-step.
“Hopefully in the future it can be, but I think we have to go step by step and we have to have a certain calm.”
If a 2027 MotoGP entry is “madness”, in the words of Martinez, a WorldSBK entry in the same year is far more likely for CFMoto. The brand, as reported by GPOne in December, hired 2019 MotoE World Champion and 2026 Ducati World Supersport rider Matteo Ferrari as a test rider for the project that would see its V4 SR-RR production bike developed for the top class of production racing possibly in time for the start of next year’s season, which will also be World Superbike’s first with Michelin tyres.
