Around 2006-2007 Rajiv Bajaj famously said that Bajaj would be exiting the 100cc segment and that it would concentrate on the 125cc segment and make that the entry level segment. Rajiv Bajaj was hoping to dent runaway sales leader Hero Honda by providing 125cc power and comfort to consumers at the price of 100cc. On the face of it the strategy seemed sound. If you can’t beat somebody in their own game, change the game. Somehow given the mindset of the Indian consumer the strategy bombed. The XCD 125cc which was supposed to change the game did not fare well in the market. The bike was designed with the mindset of designing a race bike. Make a small, compact,light motorcycle which will be extremely fuel efficient. To up the ante Bajaj even started advertising its engine tech, in this case the Dts-si engine, which was Digital twin spark (two spark plugs) swirl induction engine. The problem is that game changing is never an easy task and the Indian consumer did not find an emotional clicking with the XCD. First it was the name itself, it was supposed to be based in the SMS lingo and pronounced Exceed but people simply ended up calling it the X C D. People also thought that the bike was too small for a 125cc (Indian perceptions are bigger the engine, the bigger the bike should be on the whole) and awkward tank extensions made the bike a questionable thing and it was just a matter of time before the XCD started sinking. Bajaj also started losing numbers in a big way and to stem the rot, Rajiv Bajaj ate humble pie and re-entered the 100cc segment with the Discover 100. This was a bit of a funny strategy because Bajaj already has the Platina 100cc. Whatever the reasons initially the bike took off like a rocket from its launch pad and sold nearly 1,20,000 units of the bike every month. However in the last two years the sales after a tremendous take off started declining and Bajaj in the last three months has seen the Discover 100 sales around the 60,000 mark, half of what they were when the launch happened. In the meanwhile the sales of the Hero Honda Splendor and Passion continue to rise. Bajaj is still finding the 100cc segment a hard one to crack what with the traditional mindset of the 100cc commuter.