India’s largest car maker, Maruti Suzuki India has posted a subdued sales performance for second consecutive month. In September 2018, Maruti’s cumulative sales stood at 162,290 units as against 163,071 units sold in the same month last year. This is a marginal decline of 0.5%.
Breaking this down further, Maruti’s domestic performance resulted in sales of 153,550 units as against 151,400 units sold in Sep 2017. This is a growth of 1.4%. Exports declined by 25% from 11,671 units to 8,740 units.
Speaking about segments, it was the Mini car segment which performed worst for Maruti last month. This segment comprises of Alto and WagonR range. In Sep 2018, this segment registered sales of 34,971 units, as against 38,479 units sold in Sep 2017. This is a decline of 9.1%. Apart from the exports, and the mini segment, Maruti posted positive sales growth in other segments.
In the compact segment, where Maruti offers Swift, Celerio, Ignis, Baleno, Dzire – sales stood at 74,011 units. This segment delivers the highest sales for Maruti every month. Compared to Sep 2017, when the company sold 72,804 units, last month they improved sales by 1.7%. Below is the detailed sales report of Maruti Suzuki India.
Maruti Suzuki is working on launching new generation of Alto and WagonR in India. Both these cars are expected to be launched before 1st October 2019, which is when the Bharat NCAP kicks in. Current versions of Alto and WagonR do not pass crash test norms, which is why they will no longer be on sale post 1st Oct 2019.
This is why new gen Alto and WagonR are going to be launched in India. These new gen variants, which are currently on test, will be larger than current variants. It will be offered with 1.0 liter petrol engine option which will be BS6 emission ready.
