Skoda India has ended the year 2021 by registering a growth of 109.8% over 2020
2021 has been a good year for Skoda’s Indian arm. The business saw strong recovery from its 2020 lows. The Czech automaker’s Indian business unit registered a strong growth of 110% in the year 2021. Overall yearly sales for Skoda stood at 23,858 units, which roughly translates into around 2,000 units per month.
If compared with other dominant market players, the numbers do seem low as car makers like Tata, Kia and Mahindra register sales of around 20-25K+ units every month. If Skoda intends to command a higher market share, it will have to look at clocking monthly sales of around 15-20K units per month.
Explosive Growth in 2021
Talking about numbers, Skoda had a dull Q1 in which it couldn’t manage to grow its sales, majorly due to lack of new product offerings. Growth for Skoda started to pick up from the second quarter of 2021, primarily due to the base effect.
It must be noted that India had witnessed a severe lockdown in Q2’20 which led to all major factories getting shut due to the first wave of Covid-19. Overall, Skoda managed to register an 85% growth in its sales figures in the second quarter of 2021. This growth helped it to register an overall growth of 24% in the first half of the year.
Skoda caught on the much required sales momentum from the second half of the year. This was majorly due to the introduction of Kushaq which significantly helped Skoda in its sales volumes.
Interestingly, since July’21, Skoda has been registering average sales of around 3,000 units, which is around 3X of its previous monthly average. In all the months of H2’21, Skoda recorded strong triple digit growths, which helped it to close the year with a strong 110% growth over last year.
Skoda India Sales Dec 2021
Talking about the last month of 2021, Skoda’s Indian arm dispatched a total of 3,234 units. This helped it to record a 148% growth over December’20 sales numbers. Also, when compared with Nov’21, it saw dealer dispatches increasing by 1,038 units which translated into a 47% growth over the previous month. Going ahead, Skoda is likely to register growth, at least in the first half of 2022. This should be driven by 2 factors, a low base effect and an updated line-up of offerings.
Plans for 2022
Skoda would be expecting its upcoming Slavia to clock at least 4-digit monthly sales. However it must be noted that the Slavia will be entering into a not-so-exciting segment of mid sized Sedans. The segment currently sees competition from the Honda City (both, 4th and 5th generation models), Maruti Suzuki Ciaz and Hyundai Verna.
VW’s Vento too happens to be a competitor however, it too will get replaced by a new model, which will be Slavia’s cousin, sharing its platform and powertrain. It would be interesting to see if Slavia will be able to attract some fresh interest from buyers to this segment.
Going ahead, both, the Kushaq and Slavia should land becoming the main number drivers for the Czech automaker in India. Models like the 2022 Kodiaq, Octavia, Superb will help it to re-affirm its presence as an affordable premium automaker while they might not be able to contribute significantly to the sales numbers directly.
