DUCATI will be expanding in South America, it has been announced at the end of last week, after it reached an agreement with Volkswagen Group Argentina.
The agreement will see CKD assembly in Cordoba, Argentina, of Ducati Scramblers, which have been the most popular of Ducati’s current motorcycles in the South American country.
Ducati’s new Argentinian factory will be its third outside of Italy, and production is set to start by the end of 2022.
The Argentinian motorcycle market is very interesting, Ducati has a strong positioning in this country in which over the years we have been able to achieve excellent results, both in terms of volumes and market share”, said Francesco Milicia, Ducati Vice President of Global Sales and After Sales.
“Starting to assemble Ducati motorcycles in Córdoba is a great joy, since Volkswagen Group Argentina will be the first VW Group subsidiary in the world to do so,” said Pablo Di Si, Executive Chairman of Volkswagen Latin America.
At the present moment, Ducati has seven dealers in Argentina, which sell bikes from across its range, including the Scramblers. Speaking of which, Ducati says the first bikes that will be assembled in its new facility will be its Scrambler Icon.
This step by Ducati and Volkswagen is yet another sign of the positive influence Germany has had on Ducati since the Italian brand was bought by VW-owned Audi AG in 2012.
Recently, VW has also been strongly linked to Formula One via both Audi and Porsche, and although the F1 race in Miami last weekend may not have been to the liking of many European fans, the economic benefit to those involved in F1 were clear. Whether the future involvement of Porsche and Audi will have any impact on Ducati remains to be seen, but it could also be true that lessons learned by VW in their F1 programmes could be transferred to their Italian-based MotoGP effort.
