Honda recently admitted that they have no plans of launching the CBR250RR in India. For once, the company has deferred from giving enthusiasts a false hope. While Honda has so far refused to elaborate on this, here is one of the possible reasons why the quarter-litre sportbike will not make it to our shores.
Honda’s way of financing the development of a new motorcycle is quite different from other manufacturers. The company has a global bike development policy, under which each region has to pay a share of each bike’s development cost. As such, in case Honda’s India division wants a specific bike to be sold here, they would have to pay up for a part of the engineering and building costs.
However, Honda Motorcycle and Scooter India might not have seen scope for a model like the CBR250RR for the Indian market. Knowing that the model might never generate enough volumes to justify the development cost and initial investment might have discouraged the Indian subsidiary from making any immediate plans for the bike. The CBR250R, which has been on sale in India since 2011, might continue to generate decent volumes, but the truth is that it failed to match up to Honda’s expectations. And considering that the CBR250RR was going to be a lot more advanced than the CBR250R, it was pretty obvious that the motorcycle would command a higher price tag. That is not exactly an encouraging piece of news for a price sensitive market like India.
This doesn’t mean Honda is giving up on the entry-level sportbike segment. Those wishing for a fun and sporty road bike still have the option of the CBR250R. The CBR250R might seem obsolete in the company of the Yamaha YZF-R3, Kawasaki Ninja 300 and the KTM RC390, but it has a definite advantage in terms of pricing. It also comes with an ABS system which the other two Japanese bikes lack. But what does the future hold? Not a lot apparently… 
