Has Honda lost its edge?

Honda's the world's largest most influential motorcycle maker. And it has been that way for many years. Honda has lead the industry coming out with revolution after revolution. First there was the CB750, then the CBX, the Interceptor, the Gold Wing, the RC30, the Valkyrie, the RC51 and so on. But the last few years have been different. It seems we've been getting fewer new models form the big H, at least in the US. And what we do get offered seems bland and devoid personality. Don't get me wrong Honda makes a fine machine, about as good as they get. But today a lot of companies make fine machines, its not enough anymore. You need new and exciting products.

Case in point; for the 2008 model year Honda has one new model, the CBR1000RR (pictured above). In contrast Ducati, a much much much smaller company stormed the industry with several new models. I understand it takes a lot of effort to produce a new sportsbike, but the other Japanese companies didn't seem to have any trouble creating a new one plus other models.

Finally there's the confusing move from their Ohio plant. Honda recently decided to cease motorcycle production in their Ohio manufacturing plants. Production (of cruisers and Gold Wings I believe) will be sent back to Japan, while the American plants will be used for Honda automobiles. What makes this strange is the falling value of the dollar makes domestic production relatively cheap. Plus cruisers will no longer have a "made in USA" appeal to them, which can be important to cruiser buyers.

So what's the cause of this slow down. Could it be Honda has grown too large and is not as nimble as they were in the past? Perhaps they have grown overly cautious and do not want to take any gambles. I'm not entirely sure, but I hope we see a change soon.