Norton Motorcycle and Chinese manufacturer Zongshen have entered into a 20 year Design and Licence agreement over an all new 650cc twin engine.
Jointly engineered and developed by Norton and Ricardo, the Euro 4 compliant engine has been specifically designed to the requirements of Zongshen, enabling the Chongqing, south-central China based manufacturer to meet current and future emissions regulations.
This is clearly an important deal for both businesses. For Zongshen it will enable them to fast track through an expensive and time-consuming development phase and allow them to continue their phenomenal growth.
Although the value of the deal is to remain private, the initial consideration paid to Norton is described as being in the “millions of dollars” with an ongoing royalty on each engine produced. The agreement is for a 20-year term - last year Zongshen produced around 4 million engines.
The engine and its’ IP, developed by Norton, is specific and exclusive to Zongshen, and it is expected the engine will be produced under the ‘Zongshen’ or ‘Cyclone’ brands.
Norton CEO, Stuart Garner, commented: “It’s a great endorsement of our new 650cc engine platform and shows the high level of engineering expertise we have here at Norton. Working with Zongshen going forwards will enable them to deliver high quality, low emission engines compliant to current global standards.
“The commercialisation of our IP is a key area for Norton and we will be investing the substantial revenue received back into our skills, training and engineering capability, thus ensuring long-term sustainability to our British made Norton motorcycles.”
Norton will continue to hand make all its own Norton engines in the UK at its Donington Hall factory.
