The rise in steel prices, the projected surge in crude oil prices and the firming up of interest rates – nothing it seems can deter the Indian car buyer. Car companies today reported double-digit increases in sales in April 2010 over April 2009. Market leader Maruti Suzuki said domestic sales were up 23.4 per cent, while Hyundai Motors, the second largest car maker in the country, reported a 28.1 per cent increase in sales.
Tata Motors surprised market experts by reporting a 72.27 per cent increase in passenger car sales. Its range of passenger vehicles starts with the Nano and includes multi-utility vehicles like the Sumo and Safari. Ford and General Motors, both riding on recent launches, too saw impressive growth in sales.
The numbers reported today are what the companies sold to their dealers. Several popular cars have run into short supply, resulting in a long waiting period for customers. For some cars, customers need to wait as long as six months. Almost all car makers are struggling with capacity constraints, and are hence looking at ways to augment production urgently.
| THE PARTY CARRIES ON Domestic Car Sales | |||
| Apr-09 | Apr-10 | Growth % | |
| Maruti Suzuki | 64,857 | 80,034 | 23.40 |
| Hyundai Motors | 22,247 | 28,501 | 28.11 |
| Tata Motors* | 13,410 | 23,102 | 72.27 |
| General Motors | 4,823 | 10,601 | 119.8 |
| Ford India | 2,034 | 7,509 | 269.17 |
| Toyota Kirloskar | 3,386 | 6,001 | 72.27 |
| *passenger vehicles includes Indica, Indigo, Safari, Sumo | |||
There was good news from the commercial vehicle segment as well. Tata Motors’ commercial vehicles sales rose 35 per cent in April, with sales of medium and heavy commercial vehicles rising 63 per cent. Commercial vehicle sales are a good barometer of the economic activity in the country. Much of the growth could be because of the low base last year, when the economic slowdown had taken its toll on commercial vehicle sales. Tata Motors is the country’s largest producer of commercial vehicles.
Two-wheeler companies too reported smart growth in April. TVS Motors grew 21.83 per cent, Yamaha 11.51 per cent and Suzuki Motorcycles 53.22 per cent. The only dampener was Hero Honda, which reported flat sales in April, as it faced a supply constraint for auto batteries.
Dispatches were adversely impacted with over 50,000 fully-finished motorcycles stranded at its plants for want of batteries. However, the company said the issue has been resolved and supply should normalise in a week. Maruti Suzuki’s overall sales (domestic sales and exports) increased 29.70 per cent in April this year at 93,058 units over the same month last year. Chairman RC Bhargava said the numbers are encouraging as the company had a strong April last year as well.
Though General Motors has done well, Vice-President P Balendran said the market may have actually shrunk in April. According to him, April car sales may be 20,000 below March due to the rise in car prices, some squeeze in liquidity (availability of finance), and advancement of purchases in earlier months
Maruti Suzuki reported a 20.50 per cent increase in sales in the A2 segment (comprising the Alto, WagonR, Estilo, Swift, A-Star and Ritz), while sales in the A3 segment sales (the SX4 and DZiRE) increased by 41.44 per cent. The sales of Maruti 800 fell by 3.71 per cent. Exports surged 89 per cent to 13,024 units from 6,891 units in the year-ago period. Hyundai saw its total sales increase by 17.24 per cent in April to 52,020 units, though exports could grow only 6.31 per cent to 23,519 units.
Riding on a good response for its newly-launched hatchback, the Figo, Ford India reported an over three-fold jump in its April sales at 7,509 units. It has booked over 15,000 Figos in the last seven weeks, and the company plans to start a second shift at its Chennai plant, where production capacity is being doubled to 200,000 units per annum.
