The sell-off of Erik Buell Racing (EBR) production assets, which took place at an auction in August, has fallen through. A new court-ordered auction is now set to take place on 10 December.
In August, American businessman and bike enthusiast Bruce Belfer had successfully bid £1.47m for EBR’s plant, tooling, parts inventory and intellectual rights appertaining to its own-brand motorcycle manufacturing. India’s Hero Motocorp had separately acquired assets of the EBR consulting and R&D division, which had been designing Hero products, for £1.83m. Belfer had hoped to restart production of the EBR 1190RX superbike, with active involvement of erstwhile supremo Erik Buell in the business.
It now transpires that Belfer had to meet a completion deadline on the deal of 30 September but Hero still had a right to claim against parts inventory until 6 October. He was therefore unable to establish exactly what assets would be included in his entitlement and get the necessary finance in place by that cut-off date.
Belfer, a scrapyard millionaire also trading as Atlantic Metals, says that he intends to bid again in the second auction but will make a lower offer. However, there is also an unconfirmed report that Polaris Industries — parent of the Indian and Victory motorcycle marques — may be competing against him this time.