Honestly, I'd love to stop talking about the corporate side-mouth talking that KTM apparently loves to do

It's not my favorite thing to cover, as I genuinely love the brand's motorcycles. They're freakin' fantastic. But my goodness, can this company just not get out of its own way?

You'll recall all the corporate idiocy that befell the brand in recent months. The insolvency proceedings, the layoffs, the recalls, the shuttering of factories, and the ousting of its CEO only to be replaced by the CEO's right-hand-protege. As well as its saving by way of one of its strategic partners, Bajaj, coming in at the 11th hour and basically buying the brand, as well as its subsidiaries. It was a mess, but the latter was meant to offer a glimpse of hope for the Austrian manufacturer.

And then, last month, KTM's CEO Gottfried Neumeister came out and proclaimed all was once again right with the world in KTM-land, as after months of uncertainty, it had sold over 100,000 motorcycles so far! Woo. But there was a caveat to that—and one that RideApart pointed out at the time—in that these motorcycles were likely all old stock that'd been sitting on dealership lots, not new bikes.

You know, because of all the manufacturing plant closures and all.

And, honestly, I figured that'd be the end of it. That is until KTM's parent company, Pierer Bajaj, released its fiscal results for the first half of 2025. They not only state that the company absolutely didn't sell 100,000 motorcycles so far this year, but that nearly half of those reported were Bajaj bikes. And not only that, but its revenue dropped a whopping 60% year-over-year. Yikes.

OK, just so you know I'm not making stuff up, here's KTM's line from July 10th from CEO Neumeister, stating, "Over 100,000 motorcycles sold in the first half gives us confidence that we’re back on the right track. Demand for all of our brands remains strong globally." Again, that's certainly cause for celebration, even though they were all old units, something the following statements prove true.

But as of today, through Pierer's earnings results, the company states, "The PIERER Mobility Group sold 50,334 motorcycles in H1 2025 (previous year: 115,145). Additionally, 34,950 motorcycles were sold through the Group’s strategic partner Bajaj Auto (previous year: 32,351)...Overall, the Group sold 85,284 motorcycles (previous year: 147,496 units)." I'm no math man, but 85,284 motorcycles isn't the 100,000+ motorcycles that Neumeister previously stated in July.

And again, nearly half of that 85,000 figure are bikes from from Bajaj, not KTM. Moreover, following that line, Pierer pretty much confirms RideApart's reporting that these are old bikes, stating, "The 42.2% decline in total sales was mainly due to the restructuring proceeding at KTM AG and the production stoppage. Additionally, the company deliberately held back on delivering and selling new models to allow time for the market to reduce global inventories. The reduced inventory level and the resulting lower capital commitment positively impacted the Group's liquidity." Emphasis mine.

When RideApart began reporting on the KTM saga last year, we told you that there was more than a year's worth of old motorcycles sitting on dealership lots around the world. Around 260,000 bikes, and some of which were from 2023. That inventory was piling up, and new models really couldn't get accepted until those bikes were gone. At the time, we theorized that KTM would need a fire sale extravaganza to right its inventory levels, and there were some sales and rebates put on old-stock motorcycles. KTM's report above confirms that's what the company did, i.e. it reduced "global inventories."

Yet, what's wild to me is that we're now less than a month since Neumeister publicly stated that it had sold more than 100,000 motorcycles, and yet the brand's own reporting contradicts that in no uncertain terms. And this was one of the same problems the company had when shit finally hit the fan last year: Who are we meant to believe in this situation, and should we take anything coming directly from the company seriously?

Throughout this whole fiasco, KTM has seemingly remained steadfast in its willingness to attempt to gaslight both the public and the media. The company will say that everything is fine; all while the dumpster behind it is on fire. No layoffs will occur, they said, but then they did; the plant wasn't going to close, then it did; it wasn't leaving MotoGP, then its insolvency manager said it would; that the company was fine, and then it came to light that it absolutely wasn't.

I'm really, truly rooting for the brand to be OK. I'm really rooting for the brand to continue into the future and make the kinds of bikes that I still dream about years after I've ridden them—come back to me, Super Duke R.

But this sort of management makes it really hard to do that.