I’ve never agreed with an executive more…especially about trends in the motorcycle industry.
In a recent interview with Business Insider, Ducati North America CEO Jason Chinnock addressed the idea of autonomous bikes head-on. He told the publication that a self-driving motorcycle would “take away the entire reason to ride a motorcycle.” He didn’t hedge it or soften it. His statement was clear: “We are not building mobility. We’re building motorcycles. We’re building something for joy and for fun,” Chinnock said. “If it takes away the ability to operate it and experience it, then just get in a pod and go from point A to point B.”
That’s not something I say lightly. If you spend enough time around boardroom announcements and product rollouts, you develop a healthy skepticism toward anything that sounds like restraint. Growth is the default setting. Expansion into adjacent categories is the norm. Tech for tech’s sake often gets dressed up as progress. But after reading that piece about autonomous motorcycles—and Chinnock’s response to the concept—I found myself nodding along. The premise alone feels like satire. A self-driving motorcycle. A machine designed, engineered, and romanticized for rider input…removing the rider.
