Bike-Branded Tech Is Dumb, But Manufacturers Keep Doing It Anyway

We motorcyclists are some of the vainest, most image-conscious folks on the face of the Earth. This is something I’ve recently become guilty of after devolving into a full-blown retro simp. Now, every single piece of gear I wear—from my helmet to my gloves, and even my jacket, pants, and boots all have to be retro.

Seriously, my friends are calling me a cosplay rider because of how I curate my riding gear. But I digress.

It doesn’t matter if you’re a retro simp, a street Rossi, or just a dude or dudette riding to work, we all want to look good on our motorcycles. And more often than not, this means matching the stuff we wear with our bike. Of course, manufacturers know this, and it’s in their best interest to give us vain riders what we want. It’s a win-win. We get our fancy, well-curated outfits to flex to our buddies, and manufacturers get to milk us of our money. Capitalism at its finest.

And the result? Special edition gear and tech that’s “co-developed” with respective motorcycle manufacturers. And I use quotation marks because the real meaning of co-developed here is just the manufacturer’s logo plastered onto the side…and maybe a few fancy color options here and there.

We’ve seen it with Cardo’s special edition Ducati and KTM PackTalks, as well as REV’IT!’s partnership with Zero for “electric motorcycle-specific riding gear.” And this time around, SENA’s doing it with Royal Enfield with a limited-edition 50S comms system designed to celebrate the success of the Super Meteor 650.

Launched exclusively in India for now, the SENA x Royal Enfield 50S intercom system is, to be fair, quite the swanky bit of kit. It’s like having a fancy infotainment system in a car, but all inside your helmet. This thing gets Harman Kardon audio, and quite a lot of connectivity features, all of which you can check out on SENA’s official website.

SENA and Royal Enfield’s special-edition 50S comms system carries a sticker price of 35,990 Rupees in India, or the equivalent of around $428 USD, which is the same price for the regular SENA 50S in India. Unfortunately for RE aficionados in other parts of the globe, thing isn’t available outside of India for now. For reference, however, the regular SENA 50S (without a Royal Enfield logo on the side) carries an MSRP of $287 in the US.

I guess a Royal Enfield sticker will have to do for now.