An Indian Successful company in High-end Products

Brand Name: Bajaj Pulsar
Parent Company: Bajaj Auto
Category: Motorcycles
Sector: Two-wheeler
Tagline/ Slogan : Definitely Male, The Fastest Indian
USP: Powerful engine and good pickup
Product Description- Bajaj Pulsar
The Bajaj Pulsar is a motorcycle brand owned by Bajaj Auto in India. The two wheeler was developed by the product engineering division of Bajaj Auto in association with Tokyo R&D,[1] and later with motorcycle designer Glynn Kerr. Currently there are five variants available, with engine capacities of 135 cc, 150 cc, 180 cc, 200 cc, and 220 cc. previously it was also offered with a 200 cc DTS-i oil cooled engine, which now has been discontinued. Instead a new version Pulsar 200NS was launched in 2012.[2] With an average monthly sales of around 86,000 units in 2011, Pulsar claimed a 2011 market share of 47% in its segment.[3] By April 2012, more than five million units of Pulsar were sold.[4]
Before the introduction of the Pulsar, the Indian motorcycle market trend was towards fuel efficient, small capacity motorcycles (that formed the 80–125 cc class). Bigger motorcycles with higher capacity virtually did not exist (except for Enfield Bullet). The launch and success of Hero Honda CBZ in 1999 showed that there was demand for performance bikes. Bajaj took the cue from there on and launched the Pulsar twins in India on 24 November 2001.[5] Since the introduction and success of Bajaj Pulsar, Indian youth began expecting high power and other features from affordable motorcycles.

SWOT Analysis of Bajaj Pulsar
Strengths:
•Very popular brand positioning (DEFINITELY MALE) which helped quite a lot in popularizing the brand
•The styling of the bike was a novelty and was in line with its macho image.
•Performance – wise, it was much better than other bikes in the same segment.

•It had an impressive mileage for a 150 cc bike, about 45 plus, which was much more than other bikes of the segment like CBZ etc.

•Since Bajaj was already in the scooter market beforehand, it could use those same resources for the distribution, sales and service for Bajaj pulsar bikes. Bajaj made after sales a priority in marketing.

•From 150cc it has diversified into varied categories like 180cc, 200cc, 220cc, air-cooled and water-cooled. Thus it has a wide range to fit every pocket.

•Bajaj has constantly worked on the mileage taking it as an important part and has improved it in the latest bikes.

•There is a constant up gradation of the model going on every time. New features like Digital speedometer, LED tail lights etc were introduced by Bajaj pulsar first of all in the Indian market.

Weaknesses
•One of the major weaknesses of Bajaj pulsar was that it was an untested product. Before this Bajaj had never come out with a product in this segment and so there was a lot of customer apprehension about the product initially.
•There are still some technical problems in the model, which are not solved like the Gear Box etc.
•There is not much of a product differentiation among the various models of bajaj pulsar as they have similar styling

Opportunity •
There was a major opportunity of export for Bajaj pulsar, since that was the time when the export markets were quite open and there was a large demand for Indian products in the foreign markets.
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To enter the higher end bike market, which is a high margin business. It is a very underdeveloped market in India; surely there would be a demand for Bajaj Pulsar products there.
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Though Bajaj is the largest bike exporter in India, it has to still enter many untested markets.
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Bajaj has an auto-financing arm of its own, which it can use to leverage its bike sales.E.g. by providing easy installments and other schemes.

Threats
•The major threat for Bajaj Pulsar in the product category was CBZ, a product from theHero-Honda stable, which was an already established brand in itself.
•Bajaj as a brand had an image of producing rustic, Indian, old scooters. This brand imagecould work against it when it was venturing into selling bikes which were moreinternationally styled.
•Yamaha and Honda were also planning to come up with similar products very soon. Cheap Chinese imports and other copycats in foreign markets trying to make a dent on its market.
•There is much more competition in the market for every segment that Pulsar is in, than it was in 2001. Other Bike manufacturers have also come up with very good products.