Fantic Motorcycles: How E-Bikes and Expensive Scramblers Created a Debt Crisis
Right, I feel it’s time to talk about Fantic. I haven’t mentioned them for quite some time, but it looks like they’re in quite deep trouble. If you’ve got a Fantic motorcycle, it’s probably time to start thinking or at least contemplating what should you be doing with it to best protect yourself should the worst happen. So, Fantic, the headline figure are 138 million euros in debt. This is a series of successive loans 2021 2023 and most recently a 70 million euro injection of cash to keep them afloat in 2024 that’s culminated in a huge debt mountain. So what went wrong for Fantic? Well, they made firstly a kind of daft decision in COVID times to overly invest in ebikes. a little bit like KTM did. Fully sort of sold on the philosophy that everyone’s going to be using ebikes in the next 5 years. Let’s jump on the bandwagon. Diversify out from our history and our heritage of making IC motorcycle scramblers and motocross bikes and we’ll pile all our resources into ebikes. Turns out the ebike thing was a flash in the pan and Italy, the home market, kind of turned its back on ebikes. exports aren’t that good either, both of combustion and electric vehicles. And so they’re basically stuck with a huge overstock of ebikes they need to get rid of, but essentially nobody wants. So they’ve got that problem. Second problem is the FantC range of motorcycles. I’m not talking about motocross, but their roadgoing motorcycles has just become hideously uncompetitive probably in the last 5 years. So, let’s talk about the Cababiro 500. They also do a 125, but Cababiro 500 was a brilliant little bike when it was launched in 2019. It was 6 12 to 7 grand depending whether you went for the standard model, the deluxe, the rally, or even the Explorer, which was the top of the tree with taller suspension um and loads of accessories. It was up to 7 1/2, 6 to 7 1/2 grand, 40 horsepower engine, single cylinder. It was a Zong Shen manufactured unit that they’d started with 250 cc’s and kind of built up in capacity to uh the full 450 39 horsepower. I think 32 foot-lb of torque and it was quite light. It was 155 kilos. I don’t know that’s dry or wet weight, but it was light. So, people who wanted to do green laning and and travel biking chose these little bikes because they looked cool. the anodized Marazaki forks. They had billet aluminum foot peg hangers, the top um handlebar clamps and everything was all machined out of solid aluminium. It was all really really nice, very stylish, very Italian, lots of flare. Um and they were they were selling well, but since 2021, what bikes like think to yourself, what bikes have come out? You’ve got the whole 350 range for Royal Enfield. Not to mention that the new 450 Himalayan which would have stolen a lot of that travel bike market from Fantic. You had the Triumph Speed 400. But interestingly the Scrambler 400X which came in at 5 12 grand when it was released again undercutting the Fantic by 2,000. Got a Triumph badge on it and also 40 horsepower and quite a good engine and good suspension. and an established dealer network. Like lot of good things about that Triumph. And then you’ve got BSA as well bringing in not only the Banttom and the Thunderbolt which is more recent but don’t forget the BSA the Scrambler and also going back to Rollenfield the Bear. Two two Scrambler motorcycles priced below the Fantic that had 650 engines not a 450 engine which the Fantic has. So in this in amongst this time, Fantic entered a collaboration with Yamaha and bang the CP2 engine into the Cababiro. Called it the Cababiro 500. Basically the same thing, billet aluminium, Marazaki sprung, um 21, no 19 on the front, 7 18 I think on the rear spoked. And then they had a nice TFT unit which made it feel a little bit more glossy than the 500 LCD and basically made this kind of fantic cross with an M07 lovely looking scrambler thing. And I really liked it. There’s only two problems. It was harshly sprung. Didn’t ride that well on the road, let alone off-road. So your adventure rider green laner type of person was out. The engine didn’t really sit well in that chassis. Uh, and the big problem as far as I’m concerned was it was 9,300 quid. So, think of today in 2025, what you can buy for the best part of £10,000. You can buy a Honda Hornet 1,000, 155 horsepower X Fireblade engine. You can buy a huge plethora of Chinese metal, all these adventure bikes with all the tech in the world, radar blind spots and full boxes. Buy that for 9 grand. You can buy sports bikes like the all the Suzuki range with that new um parallel twin 776cc. Basically, you can buy the whole world you can buy for 10 grand if you’re interested in small to mid-capacity motorcycles. So the 700 Cabierro didn’t really sell and then you’re left with the 500. So it does have its fans and they thought right seeen as everyone else is going towards Chinese Chinese manufacturing we’re going to chuck out our Zong Shen engine and we’re going to make a brand new engine using Moto Minelli. They bought Moto Minelli, the engine Italian engine manufacturer, and they bring that in house and Moto Minelli starts making a brand new from the groundup engine for the Fantic Cabierro 500. Still a 450, still a single, just basically doesn’t have the Chinese kind of association with it. It’s Italianmade engine for an Italianmade bike. So, this engine has gone from the old Zong Shen’s 39 and a half horsepower to 44 and a half horsepower. So, it’s a little bit of a bump in horsepower, but the torque actually dipped slightly by half a foot pound. It’s now 31 and a half foot. So really, they’ve now selling this bike on its premium Italian manufacturer from Mini Scrambler, but it doesn’t really make people, I don’t think, go into the dealerships and whack out the price of six and a half. I think it’s even crept up. Let’s just have a quick check. Have a look at my cutouts. No. No. 25 2025 Cabiro Rally. £7,199. It is crazy. I mean, 150 kg dry weight, 43 horsepower quoted here, 12 L fuel tank. Um, yes, it looks lovely, but who the hell is going to buy it for 7,200 with what else you can buy for that that money? So, their plan with the new engine is to fit it across a wide array of different types of motorcycle, not only the Scramblers, but also a naked using a single cylinder 450. Okay, fine. But again, lots of competition in that naked space. Also, they want to put it in a sport bike with a single cylinder 450. And like I know this 450 sports bike’s coming through, but a lot of them are twins. I mean, or even four cylinders. It’s a little bit odd to have a single cylinder sport bike, but okay. And then finally, they’re hinting at putting this engine in a 450 adventure bike. Again, nothing against that idea, but it’s so competitive with Royal Enfield, BSA, CF Moto, Triumph. It you’re going to go in there and you’ve really got to be top-notch to compete. So, I kind of see what they’re doing using set engine platform and diversifying out. I mean, it worked for Royal Enfield, but it’s to me it looks like an uphill struggle. They’ve got a new CEO, new export plans, new everything. He’s come out and said they’re going to spend or they’re going to achieve a turnover of 115.3 million euros. You think that’s their turnover, but their debt is actually about 110 115% of their entire turnover. So that’s not profit. That’s their turnover. Say they say they profit is 10% of their turnover. It’s going to take years and years and years to pay back that debt mountain. What’s more likely is that Fantic are going to take on more and more debt and eventually they’re not going to be able to pay back their creditors and they’re going to go into bankruptcy. That’s my honest feeling about it and I just I would warn anyone who is looking at the Cababiro or the not don’t buy the 700. It’s just not it’s just not good value. But even the 500 caviar, yes, it’s stunning looking, but the ground has changed underneath Fantic. And I just I would just avoid it. I have to say I don’t like to bash on manufacturers, but don’t get caught out and buy something that it it looks ropey. Now if fant fant if fantick get bought out by a big Indian company or even the Chinese and that you start having a more established dealer network and you know that somebody with big pockets is behind them and fine but at the moment they’re still kind of independent and they’re in a lot of debt and I would just be really careful before you go in and buy a fancy at least at least do your research. Um, so sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but it’s just something I would be very very careful about um about doing basically. Guys, hope you enjoyed this video and I’ll catch you in the next one.
This really is a sad story about how one of the more special Motorcycle manufacturers made a huge misstep into e-bikes and didn’t react to changing market conditions affecting their ICE machines.
#fantic #cabellero500
