Ducati signed off 2018 in style after shifting 53,004 motorcycles to customers worldwide. Ducati claims that they have now broken the 50,000-bike per-year threshold, first reached by company in 2015, for the last four years running.
The Panigale family takes up a fair chunk of the accountant’s spreadsheet, with 9,700 bikes (70% increase on 2017), being either the V-Twin of V4 machines. This means Ducati sit firmly at the top of the superbike segment with a market share of over 26%. In 2018 one superbike out of every four sold worldwide was a Ducati Panigale.
The newly introduced, and much-lauded V4 chipped in a massive 6,100 units sold globally in just its first year, more than paying back the hard work of the design and development teams who helped to created it.
Equally successful was the Multistrada range, that in 2018 scored 11,829 motorcycles sold. The family saw the addition of the new Multistrada 1260 and 1260S, thanks to which sales soared by 25% (compared to 2017), with no less than 6,569 bikes sold.
Ducati CEO Claudio Domenicali had this to say:
"While 2018 was challenging for the big motorcycles market, with slowdowns in important countries like the US, Ducati had, by the end of the year, delivered over 53,000 bikes to customers worldwide, consolidating the growth achieved in recent years.
"In 2018 we achieved stability and the year was positive both in terms of business and racing. We won numerous MotoGP races and developed an exceptional bike. In short, the solidity of the company remains undisputed, as does our penchant for driving ahead with innovation and product development so we can, over the coming years, continue offering customers new icons of style and technology.”
In Italy growth proved to be solid, (+4.5%) reaching 9,200 bikes and making the country go back to being Ducati's largest market.
Spain also performed strongly with 2,444 motorcycles sold (+8%), with further growth observed in Japan with 1,941 bikes (+2%) and Switzerland with 1,276 bikes (+2.2%).
Bike deliveries in the USA - historically Ducati's number one market - totalled 7,843, the drop in sales reflecting a 9% downturn across the US sector of motorcycles over 500 cc.
In Asian markets, Ducati continues to ride the upward trend, especially in China (+29%) where a new direct branch has been established and the sales network has expanded from 19 to 23 dealerships.
