Daelim Motorcycles

Daelim is a South Korean manufacturer founded in 1962 as part of DL Industries, beginning motorcycle production in Seoul the following year under license to build Honda-designed models for the domestic market. Honda's formal technical collaboration with Daelim followed in 1981, and the company built its own R&D center in Hamamatsu, Japan, in 1976 before starting mass production of in-house designs in 1977. Daelim developed its first fully self-engineered 100cc motorcycle in 1992, having produced Honda-licensed machines for three decades prior. At its peak the company built more than 300,000 vehicles a year. In 2018 Daelim's motorcycle division was spun off as a standalone Daelim Motorcycle business, and in 2021 that company rebranded entirely as DNA Motors. Daelim's history is therefore split between a long run as Honda's Korean licensee and a more recent, separately-branded chapter under the DNA Motors name.