Hero MotoCorp Ltd. Impulse motorcycles are displayed at a Pashupati Motors dealership in New Delhi, India (Photographer: Prashanth Vishwanathan/Bloomberg)
Mumbai-based Mahindra & Mahindra posted a 10 percent increase in auto sales for March at 62,077 units. The company had sold 56,202 in March last year. The passenger vehicles segment, which includes utility vehicles, cars and vans clocked sales of 26,555 units compared to 25,523 units in the same month last year, a rise of 4 percent.
Ashok Leyland has posted a 20 percent increase in sales for March at 22,453 units as against 18,701 units in April last year. Light commercial vehicle sales for the company during the month jumped 58 percent to 5396 units as against 3424 units, an year ago. The Chennai-based auto maker’s sales for the year-ended March grew 21 percent to 1.74 lakh units.
Royal Enfield, the two-wheeler division of Eicher Motors Ltd., reported a 27 percent jump in total sales to 76,087 units in March. The two-wheeler manufacturer had sold 60,113 units in March 2017.
The company sold 8,20,492 units in financial year 2018-19 as against 6,66,490 units in the previous fiscal, up 23 per cent, Eicher Motors said in a BSE filing.
Exports during the month under review grew by 20 percent to 1,878 units as compared to 1,564 units in March 2017.
Tata Motors Ltd.’s local sales jumped 35 percent in March aided by the commercial vehicles and passenger vehicles segments.
Sales in India rose to 69,440 units as against 51,309 units over last year, Tata Motors said in an exchange filing today. Exports rose 17 percent to 6,643 units in the same period.
Sales of passenger vehicles rose more than 30 percent to 20,266 units led by demand of Tiago and Tigor. Commercial vehicle sales rose 37 percent year-on-year to 49,174 units on account of the “government’s push towards infrastructure development, restriction on overloading, road construction and mining activities along with increasing demand from e-commerce and FMCG applications,” the filing added.
The mini segment, which consists of models like Maruti Suzuki Alto and WagonR, saw an increase of 21.1 percent as the company sold about 37,511 units.
Sales of the compact segment, which consists of models like the Swift, Celerio, Baleno and Dzire, increased 13.5 percent to 68,885 units on a year-on-year basis. The company also sold over 4,321 units of its sedan Ciaz as compared to 4918 units in March 2017, a decline of 12.1 percent.
Sales of utility vehicles dominated by Maruti Suzuki Vitara Brezza continued to rise by over 24.3 percent. Maruti Suzuki sold a total of 22,764 units last month. This also includes the sales of Gypsy, Ertiga and S-Cross.
Indian automobile makers are expected to end the financial year 2018 with a bang. That’s according to a BloombergQuint poll of two brokerage houses, which suggest double-digit sales growth in March for all segments, be it commercial vehicles or two-wheelers.
Most interaction with the leading channel partners indicates strong demand momentum across segments in March, Jinesh Gandhi, analyst at Motilal Oswal wrote in a report.
Sales across the country — especially in the north and west region — gained traction in the previous two months aided by festive season demand and improving rural sentiment on rising income and government spending.
The medium and heavy commercial vehicle industry is also likely to sustain strong around 15 percent year-on-year growth, Nomura Analyst Kapil Singh said in a research note. “It could have been much higher if not for capacity constraints."
