It seems that there is some good news for the Indian car market, which has been in a slump for a while now. On one hand where most segments are experiencing a downfall, the market for luxury cars is rising. This can be quantified by the fact that companies like Mercedes-Benz, Jaguar Land Rover, Audi and Volvo have experienced growth in 2013, sources have claimed. Incredibly, German car maker Mercedes-Benz registered a growth of around 22 per cent till July for the fiscal year 2013-2014 as it sold around 4575 units.
On the other hand, Jaguar Land Rover India, which sells performance models like XKR, XF and recently launched F-Type, has recorded a growth of approximately 68 per cent in the previous quarter. Apart from Mercedes-Benz and Jaguar Land Rover, Swedish auto maker Volvo, according to reports, has also seen a growth of 50 per cent in the same period.
In a recent interview, Eberhard Kern, the Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director of Mercedes-Benz, spoke at length about the firm's aggressive strategy towards the Indian car market. “2013 is the year of offensive for Mercedes-Benz India as we have unleashed some of our most fascinating products for the Indian market. At Mercedes-Benz India, we are getting future ready as we are not only launching new segments, but also continuously investing in our production facility in India, strategically expanding our network and also enhancing our cost of ownership programmes. Though the market currently is going through a downturn, we firmly believe that, only fundamentally strong brands like Mercedes-Benz, are able to do better and reverse the trend,” Kern said.
Statistics suggest that in terms of overall sales, German car maker Audi is leading the charts with around 5551 units being sold. Industry experts, however, are touting Mercedes-Benz to gain an upper hand in the segment due to the high number of vehicles it has launched. In the past few months, Mercedes-Benz introduced B-Class diesel and the E63 AMG. Analysts are predicting that the battle between these luxury car makers is likely to stiffen as the festive season is approaching. Also, a number of new vehicles are expected to be introduced by companies, such as the Audi Q3 S and BMW 1 Series, which are likely to compete with the Mercedes-Benz A-Class and B-Class.
Apart from this, reports suggest that Jaguar Land Rover will introduce the Range Rover Sport whereas Volvo S80 and Volvo XC90 cars are expected to be launched by the end of year end. And it is not just the existing players that are competing, Fiat is slated to launch the world known Jeep brand in India through cars like Wrangler and Grand Cherokee.
Commenting on the growth experienced by Volvo Auto India, Tomas Ernberg, its Managing Director, was quoted as saying, “The year 2013 has been very good so far. We have achieved a 33 per cent YTD (Jan-July) growth (from 352 cars in Jan-Jul 2012 to 468 cars in Jan-Jul 2013). Despite challenging market and circumstances, Volvo Cars have witnessed increasing strength in the Indian luxury cars segment with continuing acceptability of our products amongst. We are overwhelmed with the faith our customers and dealer partners have bestowed on us, and we are on track to achieve our target of 1000 Volvo Cars in calendar year 2013.”
