While KTM is focussing its investments on the MotoGP project and disowns its cycling experience - publicly called 'a burden' and 'a strategic mistake' by industrial partner Bajaj - Ducati is making the opposite decision.
The Borgo Panigale-based manufacturer will launch from March 2026 a full range of road, gravel and electric mountain bikes, developed in collaboration with Diamant, an Italian company specializing in carbon. The goal is to transfer Ducati's iconic DNA of design, performance and prestige to cycling.
The decision comes while the market is saturated and in crisis, the same one that KTM described as an industrial catastrophe. Ducati, however, sees this as an opportunity and has surrounded itself with three leading figures in Italian cycling: Elia Viviani, Olympic champion, as consultant for the racing side; Vincenzo Nibali, Grand Tours legend, for the development of road models; and Lorenzo Suding, multiple downhill champion, as technical guide for the e-MTB sector.
This is nothing new, however, because already in the recent past Ducati had signed a partnership with the bicycle firm THOK, in which one of the partners was former MotoGP manager Livio Suppo.