Sometime later this week, Mahindra two-wheelers are set to take acquisition of Peugeot’s scooter business. This is another such sweet Indo-European venture and this means two things; one, the Indian audience will get to lay their hands on these French cuties and second, the French two-wheelers manufacturer gets a solid backing from Mahindra & Mahindra. There are speculations that M&M might go for a full ownership later on.
This will M&M’s second stake after their initial plunge into the two-wheelers fray back when they acquired 80% of Kinetic Motor Company. For Peugeot, this comes as a blessed relief since the French manufacturer is staring at some difficult financial decisions. So this venture is actually a strategic outcome for both the firms.
This wise Indo-French deal will provide Peugeot to enter India and other such emerging markets where scooters are a must-have! M&M will also benefit from technological inputs from Peugeot and also allow them to permeate the EU. Added benefits of this deal will be of course, a solid boost in the sales figures. Having said that, we think that the acquisition of a money-bleeding setup such as Peugeot Scooters could also be a rather tricky one for M&M since they themselves are in a bout of losses because of the slim figures reflecting on their own sales board. The Mahindra Gusto is spear-heading this very fight in an attempt to make some profit in this competitive yet, booming market where M&M only accounts for a trivial 1% of the overall market share. The Gusto, which is designed to be exported to important markets such as Africa, South Asia and Central America is going to be a key player in reviving M&M’s fortunes.