Agreed, I could see Shimano giving up the lower market but Tiagra is great entry level sweet spot without being super low level like Sora and Claris. I mean now Tiagra is specced on $1500+ bikes these days.
Yeah, if 105 Di2 was $1500 or a bit lower for the whole groupset it would make more sense. But it’s much closer to $2000 which is not much lower than Ultegra where you get some extra stuff like the accessory buttons, servo wave, lighter, etc.
IIRC correctly all the OEM on Willier bikes in the early noughties were campagnolo. Campag discontinued the groupset but for several years you could still get new Willier bikes with the groupset.
I’m not sure if its technically classed OEM but you can pick up new Bianchis with Campag if the purchase specified it (I think it cost me £20 more than Shimano when I ordered a 928 in circa 2006).
There have been occasional instances of brands spec’ing Campag, but theya re few and far between. For instance, for a while in the 90’s Marin did road bikes and every bike was spec’d w/ Campag.
The issue is logistics and timing. Campag produces their goods in the EU and the overwhelming majority of complete bikes are produced in Asia. Leaving aside capacity issues (not insignificant), the extra time, cost and complexity required to spec Campag makes it challenging (at best).
And Campag itself has no interest in OEM spec anymore…they have made the decision to forego any kind of significant OEM spec in favor of keeping their EU manufacturing basis.
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Not that I’ve heard, but you could buy 105Di2 and just swap out the shifters to Ultegra…
So a ‘cheap’ 105 Di2 bike is $4500 CAD (TCR) will a 105 mechanical 12 speed bike be $1k cheaper? Perhaps thats why 105 di2 seems over priced to allow for the 105 12 spd mechanical bikes to sit at that $3500 price point.