Birel, IAME and Kart Republic now part of Korus Group
This comes on the heels of OTK/Vortex and TM consolidating and now being under the private equity companies BIC Capital and QCapital.
Business is business, but yeah all rather feels ‘end of era’ type stuff.
Agreed. None of this feels “Warm and fuzzy” or “Exciting”…
It is to be expected. BRP (parent of Rotax) is owned by Bain Capital of Mitt Romney fame.
At least with Drudi off to LKE we have some possibility of a giant killing on the International front.
I think a lot are consolidating because the market is saying the demand for new karts . Is not there cost has gone up and people are not buying new ones as much.. Market got flooded with them. And to stay alive and stay in business have to consolidate.. Sign of the times. Not being a downer just a reality of what world we live in now.. More people like there iphones and computers than go and spend money on motorsports..
Might be a good thing. Branch off the F5 stuff, they can keep the extra bodywork etc that comes with it and the rest of the sport can go about its business.
I think the Formula 5 stuff will be the absolute foundation of the strategy going foreword.
OOTL on Formula 5. The hell is that ?
The absurdities FIA is doing to ‘karting’ under the guise of making it ‘safer’, and the general way in which they’re positioning themselves with no regard to the wider karting ecosystem are all pointing the funnel to F4, thus making karting F5.
This happens in all areas of industry and in all sports. Look at the consolidation of manufacturing in the automotive industry generally. The Tour de France bike brands are much the same too. The best you can hope for is that some diversity remains. There are only two things you can do to help that happen. Either start your own kart manufacturing business or make sure you buy from the independent.
On a positive note, in the UK at least, it’s currently much less of a monobrand culture now vs 15 years ago when pretty much everyone was on an OTK.
Private equity has never led us astray before…
It Was Vulture Capitalism that Killed Sears - The American Prospect
Maybe the EU has better restriction on Private Equity just killing companies and the stakeholders walking away with golden parachutes.
At this point I think the only one excited of OTK and TM partnership was my father because he always wanted OTK to replace Vortex with TM so their KZ program could be better. 
TM supposedly should be safe for the homologation that comes now, but who knows.
I always see more diversity in X30 races at the very least. Also, how the monobrand chassis culture happened in the UK?
TM r3 is already being sold in EU.
Who know what’s gonna happen next , but for sure we will see more partnership in the future.
As markets emerge and mature (think India) and personal finances allow, I predictt the ‘old 3rd world’ will experience something like we did in the 60’s-70’s – frankensteined karts with small engines from a plethora of sources, and small tracks that FIA would choke if they saw…
The bad news is that behemoths have a hard punch…. the good news is they move slowly and limber upstarts can avoid the swings (mostly.)
Perhaps Margay, MGM, Coyote, et. al. will have a growth window…at least domestically.
I’m really envious of the Euro pricing on engines/chassis. Roughly 5,200USD vs $6000USD and probably another $100-$200 in shipping. This might be the standard versus total black pricing so not the fairest comparison.
To replace my like for like “special” engine is $6500. My wife is going to kill me.
Never mind. Found the Total Black listing. It’ basically $5800USD in a direct currency conversion.
Love that the Dollar is getting is ass kicked by Euro…
And how much “tarif” will be paying on top of that?
You need to add about 2.3k $ in taxes and duties to import in the States
Yeah, I imagine there is a tariff surcharge not showing and taxes here in Arizona run almost 10%. So, it’s a $7K engine for the Special by the time it lands at my shop.
I should have gotten into a cheap hobby….
Karting will, unfortunately, be an interesting microcosm to study as the WEF and EU try to ratchet down increasing control over people’s access to resources. I’d love to see the merger / acquisition details.
They’re phasing out vehicle ownership. Centralization is essential. This is predictable when you look at their longer term goals and who they have installed into the FIA.
The next step will be taxing it out of existence. They love to use insurance actuaries for this in other areas of their war on humanity.
PSL’s published pricing is MSRP, and not reflective of current tariffs. So add 15%, and add shipping…
I’ve quoted a couple of R3’s to folks, and have a couple on order. The figure I’ve presented for the Special version (polished gearbox and carb) is about $7,500 before accessories and such. You’d laugh if you saw my margin (spoiler, it’s low).
Mondo doesn’t look to have a Special version available.
