Maruti, M&M lead sales, Hyundai, Tata lag behind

Riding high on the success of Maruti Udyog (MUL) in the domestic market, passenger car sales went up by 18.48% (MUL, GM, Hyundai Motors India, Honda-Siel, Skoda, Tata Motors, Mahindra) in June 2007 over those in the same month last year. Sales of cars of the seven companies together - which declared their figures- went up to 113,029 in June 2007 from 95,394 last year in the same month.

A substantial portion of the growth was propelled by new cars which were launched this year in the market which includes the- Maruti SX4 and Swift diesel, M&M's Logan (which sold 2389 units constituting for 18.39% of M&M's auto sales) and Chevrolet Spark(sold 1504 units which accounts for 31.5% of GMs sales).

Of course, the attractive numbers, despite the pressure of high intererest cost on loans, were driven largely by MUL whose domestic sales jumped by 25.48% to 56,000 units in June this year as against 44,626 units sold during the same month of the previous year. MUL sales grew by just 9.91% in May 2007,(with sales of 55951 units) over the previous year.

Its growth came mainly from both the A2 and A3 segment lead by the launch of the SX4-clearly indicating a shift in the market of consumers to bigger cars. The A2 segment, comprising the Alto, Swift, Wagon-R and Zen Estilo, grew by 38%at 37,646 units in June, while the A3 segment (SX4 and the Esteem )grew by 46% at 3,923 units. However, the sales of Maruti 800 went down by 20.3%  selling just 6214 cars.

Ashutosh Goel, Auto Analyst, Edelwiess, said "Sales of Maruti have exceeded the expectation even when the company initiated a shut down at its facility during the month. Swift diesel and the SX4 helped the company better its sales".

However Korean car maker Hyundai Motor India saw a drop of 4% in its domestic sales at 16,335 units as against 17,032 units posted during the same month of the previous year. HMIL had reported a growth of 3.36% at 16,643 units in May 2007. Exports of cars by the company helped it achieve an overall sales growth of 1.47% at 27,653  units during June 2007.

Hyundai Santro and Getz (A2 segment) took a hit with segment sales dipping by 49% to 13,630 units when compared with 27,228 units in June 2006. However, sales of its mid-sized segment grew by 9.59% to 2,593 units from 2,366 units primarily due to sales of Verna which sold 2,256 units.

Arvind Saxena, VP, marketing and sales, HMIL, said: "We are sure, the next few months will see stronger retail as we overcome our capacity constraints with the new plant starting operations later this year".

Sales of Tata Motors fell by 5.7% to 17,418 units in the domestic market as against 18,465 units posted in the same month of the previous year. The Indica fell by 4.4% to 11,727 units with the Indigo sedan witnessing a drop of 18.4% to 2,354.

Mahindra and Mahindra (M&M) posted a sales growth of 64.75% at 12,986 units for the month of June 2007 as against 7,882 units posted during the same month of the previous year.

General Motors, the fourth largest car maker in terms of market share, posted sales of 4,779 units, up by 43% for the month of June 2007 from 3346 units posted during the same month of the previous year. While Honda Siel Car India (HSCI) posted a growth of 27% in June selling 4503 units as against 3,549 units sold during the same month of the previous year. And Skoda Auto India sold 1008 units during June, up by 1.92% as against 989 units sold during the previous year.