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IMMA, as the global voice of the Motorcycle Industry, will promote solutions for safe, sustainable, socially responsible, and economically viable motorcycle mobility.
IMMA offers the motorcycle industry a united voice and continuous presence in the regulatory activities of the United Nations (UN) and other international forums. With decades of regulatory experience and policy expertise, IMMA serves the crucial role of being the primary intermediary between motorcycle manufacturers and international organisations. By ensuring constant liaison with the industry, IMMA enables manufacturers to plan their individual product development and deployment.
Manufacturers continue to undertake product innovations and make major investments to offer consumers products which are safer, cleaner, more efficient and — no less important — even more enjoyable to use, as part of a viable future mobility system.
IMMA and our members are committed to sustainable motorcycling as part of the future of mobility.
Founded in 1948 as the International Permanent Bureau of Motorcycle Manufacturers – Bureau Permanent International des Constructeurs de Motocycles (BPICM), the organization sought to coordinate between national industries during the reconstruction period following the Second World War.
Under the auspices of the United Nations (UN), the 1958 Agreement of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) was established, aiming at harmonizing technical requirements for road vehicles via a UNECE regulatory framework.
Since these regulations also covered motorcycles and mopeds, BPICM decided in 1975 to employ a permanent staff to ensure that the motorcycle industry could be professionally represented in UN meetings in Geneva.
As a result, BPICM became the accredited organisation towards the UN for the motorcycle industry in international technical exchanges with the administrations and Contracting Parties to the relevant legal instruments, including also the 1968 Vienna Convention on road traffic safety.
In 1987, BPICM changed its name to the International Motorcycle Manufacturers Association (IMMA), ushering a new era for the organisation.
The growing importance of the UNECE’s World Forum for Harmonization of Vehicle Regulations (WP.29) among others as a result of the World Trade Organisation’s (WTO) developments, calling for more harmonization in technical legislation across the globe, resulted in IMMA moving from Paris to Geneva. The new office was registered in accordance with Swiss law in 1996. At that time, the meeting structure was also revised to better deal with harmonization, and the membership structure of the organisation was regionalized as a reflection of the major economic and industrial blocks in the world, at that time the US, Europe, and Japan.
Since then, the 1998 Agreement and many new players in the economic arena have truly globalized the work done by UNECE, with major consequences for IMMA: several new members joined the association and regional representation was updated to best reflect the major Powered Two-Wheeler (PTW) markets. These changes were, and are, reflected in regular reviews of the IMMA Constitution.
From its very beginning, IMMA has been a member-driven organization with a small but efficient secretariat providing essential services to the expert committees, which presently deal with environmental, safety, and harmonization technical issues, as well as with road safety matters.
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