Sunday, February 10, 2008

Car sales up, but bikes falls 14%

Automobile sales continued to remain sluggish, even though companies postponed major price hikes and rolled out huge discounts to lure customers to their showrooms, reports Economic Times.

Overall auto sales fell by 4.82% to 8,022,000 units in the 10 months of the 2008-09 fiscal, against 8,428,000 units last year. Annualised growth for passenger car sales dipped to 12.79% for the 10-month period as against 13.39% growth in the first nine months of the current fiscal.

According to the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM), domestic passenger car sales grew by 9% to 113,899 units in January as against 104,501 units in the same month last year.

Korean car major Hyundai Motor India, on the back of its new compact hatchback i10, posted the highest ever growth in domestic sales of 39.22% to 24,296 units as against 17,452 units last year. For passenger car market leader Maruti Suzuki India, sales remained flat at 54,366 units in January against 54,372 units in the same month last year.

General Motors India, which restarted its price discount on the compact car Spark last week, saw increased sales in January to 4,030 units as against 1,665 units last year.

The worst performance came from the motorcycle segment, which fell by 14% to 481,267 units from 560,056 units in the year-ago.

Market leader Hero Honda`s sales fell by 1.64% to 290,005 units, while the second-largest player Bajaj Auto`s monthly sales were down 21.6% to 148,660 units. Chennai-based TVS Motors, the third-largest player, saw a 29.6% dip in sales to 80,277 units in January. However Japanese major Honda Motorcycle and Scooters India managed to remain positive, with its sales increasing by 8.78% to 74,460 units in January. Sales of commercial vehicles reduced by 1% to 46,788 units in January, from 47,251 units last year.

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