KENI | 1921-23 | Germany :
The Keni was one of a large number of small, short-lived motorcycle manufacturers that emerged in Germany in the early 1920s, operating from Berlin under the full company name Keni Motorenbau-Gesellschaft m.b.H., Berlin SW.68, and manufacturing from 1921 to 1924.
The conditions that gave rise to the Keni were felt across the whole country. Hundreds of small factories in Germany began making motorcycles in the early 1920s in response to the need for light, inexpensive transportation that had arisen after World War I. Because of the large number of brands, they were forced to find customers in their own region, since a large dealer network could not be built up. Berlin was particularly fertile ground for this activity. As a result of the Greater Berlin Law of 1920, Berlin became the largest industrial city in Europe, and the city’s concentration of engineering workshops, component suppliers and potential customers made it a natural base for small-scale vehicle manufacture. Contemporaries in the Berlin motorcycle trade included the Orionette, Autoflug, DSW, Solomobile, and numerous others, almost all of which flourished briefly and then disappeared under the pressure of hyperinflation and the consolidating market.
The firm produced three models. The Type A and Type B were very similar, with a 160cc engine and two-speed gearbox, the Type B having disc wheels. There was also a 143cc lightweight. An advertisement from the period shows two machines with conventional spoked wheels, one with the engine mounted above the pedal crank and the other with the engine mounted lower in the frame. Another advertisement titled Keni Sport-Scheibenrad 2.5 P.S. shows a flat-tank motorcycle with disc wheels, kick-starter and aluminium footboards.
The disc-wheel Sport model was a styling statement as much as a mechanical one. Disc or Scheibenrad wheels appeared on several German lightweight machines of the period and conveyed a sense of modernity and sporting intent that spoked wheels did not. The two-speed gearbox on both the Type A and Type B placed the Keni ahead of the simplest single-speed machines of the day, offering the rider practical assistance on hills and in varying traffic conditions. The aluminium footboards on the Sport model were a detail more commonly found on scooter-influenced designs than on conventional lightweights.
Many companies closed due to hyperinflation in 1924 and 1925, and the Keni was among those that did not outlast the economic turbulence of the mid-decade. By 1924, the field in which it had operated was thinning rapidly as German motorcycle production began concentrating around the larger and better-capitalised firms that would define the industry in the years to come.
