Ed Huntress wrote:

Do you know anything about the motorcycle market in China?
The reason I ask is that in many countries people buy motorcycles
before they can afford cars.

I don't know much, except that they make a lot of small ones, and making
them was a big state-run enterprise a few years ago. I'll bet you could find
the numbers with some research effort on Google.

Read a blurb a year or so ago in a motorcycle mag about China's emerging
motorcycle manufacturing efforts. As in mold making, their stated goal
was a fairly significant portion of the global market. The picture that
accompanied the article showed a bike that probably would sell well
there, but sure wouldn't fly over here. Motorcycles are generally an
enthusiast product, and the near death of the econo-bike market in favor
of sport bikes, cruisers, and touring bikes (all higher dollar status
machines) shows that bikers shop performance and/or image first. The
Japanese are smart and how many decades did it take them to figure out
that a proper cruiser was more than goofy handlebars and a sissy bar?
The big 4 from Japan had to establish design centers here in the US
before really getting a grasp on what the US market wants, at least in
the street bike arena.
I think it will be decades before they really penetrate the US market
with bikes designed in country.

Jon