British motorcycle brand Norton's new owners, TVS Motor Company has agreed to honour deposits that customers had already paid to the previous management of Norton Motorcycles. To facilitate this, customers will have to transfer their deposits from the old business to the new one. According to new details revealed by Administrators BDO, there were three offers for Norton, and India's TVS Motor Company made the best offer. TVS paid 15 million GBP for the intellectual property of Norton Motorcycles, plus additional 1 million GBP for equipment and stock.
Also Read: TVS Acquires Norton Motorcycles
TVS acquired Norton Motorcycles in April 2020, in an all-cash deal of 16 million GBP
As part of the deal, TVS agreed to honour previously paid deposits for Norton bikes, and complete those orders. If customers don't want to avail of their orders, they can be reimbursed, but they will join the long list of creditors that are going to be reimbursed by BDO. In addition to this, there were already some bikes that were in the shop for warranty claims. Although the deal doesn't explicitly mention that TVS has to honour those warranty claims, the Indian two-wheeler giant has agreed to remedy at least some of these warranty claims.
Also Read: Norton Motorcycles Looks At Expanding Workforce Under TVS Ownership
New owners TVS will also honour some warranty claims of existing Norton owners
Now, more and more creditors are emerging who need to be paid by BDO. First in line is Metro Bank, who was owed 4.04 million GBP by Norton, which has now been repaid in full. Tudor Capital has also raised a claim of 1.7 million GBP and BDO's investigation has revealed that the claim is valid, and they plan to make the repayment. The good thing is that the new TVS-owned management has taken on all employees of Norton Motorcycles, and it's not expected that they will make any claims. Still further claims have come from trustees of three pension schemes, and it's still not clear what the status of those claims are. BDO says they are still taking legal advice on the matter.
