First, realize that about 95% of press releases are about 95% crap. I've learned this while day-trading and working for publicly-traded companies.
I have an issue with the plan to cut production. If Yamaha cuts production then the cost of each motorcycle will increase since it will carry more of the fixed & direct costs as compared to more produced units. This may indicate that showroom price of our beloved FJR will go up in the future.
The statement with reducing fixed costs is a bit misleading because there is no indication if that includes capital, overhead, non-production payroll, non-production indirect costs, etc. My guess is the only people who knows what that means are the people at the mgmt level.
Also, we have no clue on how much of the 2009 1st & 2nd qtr loss includes non-cash items such as depreciation, amortization, inventory write downs, real estate write downs, etc. Of course there is to be expected a lower net profit than prior years due to the economy... but to have a clear view we would have to know the amt of non-cash items in that loss. We also are not given a cash-flow statement which is a great tool to measure the true profitability of the company.
Yamaha Motor Corp may be electing to take write downs on inventory and capital assets for tax purposes before those items are addressed by Congress and possibly have the deduction eliminated. This is a very common practice in the business world after a political shift in Washington.
About 9 years ago Toyota purchased a small stake in Yamaha. If there is big need for Yamaha to address production costs & efficiency then more than likely we will see Toyota share production technology with Yamaha.
Yamaha is number 2 in world-wide sales of motorcycles behind Honda. The bad side of this is probably there is a lot of useless overhead that can be cut. The good side of this is Yamaha has the production capacity and delivery system to sale motorcycles in every major market in the world, not just in the US and Europe. Right now China is Buick's largest & fastest-growing sales region in the world. Buick has focused most of it's sales in the future in China than the US. I expect Yamaha to do the same - to target it's fastest-growing sales base and proceed from there.
I doubt that Yamaha will stop production of the FJR. To do so would add additional losses in the next 3-5 years to the income statement, which according to the press release, is something Yamaha is aiming to avoid. But there is a strong possibility the FJR may not be given a new model for a few years and the base price may increase.
(Edit)
Publicly-traded companies can no longer expense R&D over several years. This may preclude Yammie from putting tons of money into new models if the company is attempting to strengthen the bottom line. A few months ago Harley cut jobs. My business sense tells me that the overall motor industry is being hit hard with slowing sales whether it be a car, motorcycle, boat, atv, etc. If you want to add a new motorized vehicle to your garage then now is the time.
