Volkswagen Group China continues with qualitative growth in first quarter 2015

Volkswagen Group China has pursued a qualitative growth in deliveries: With its two Chinese Joint Ventures, Shanghai Volkswagen and FAW-Volkswagen, the Group delivered 898,400 vehicles to customers from January to March this year, realizing growth of 2 per cent over the same period of last year. “Volkswagen is on course to achieving healthy, sustained growth in 2015. We aim to maintain our leading market position in China through an enhanced product portfolio and to increase full-year deliveries in this growing market.” said Prof. Dr. Jochem Heizmann, Member of the Board of Management of Volkswagen Aktiengesellschaft as well as President and CEO of Volkswagen Group China.

“China is a key market for the Volkswagen Group,” commented Prof. Dr. Jochem Heizmann.  “Our Chinese plants are a synonym for outstanding quality and highest environmental standards. With more state-of-arts plants to be opened this year, we will gradually increase our production capacity to over 5 million vehicles by 2019 to satisfy the persistently high demands of our Chinese customers, as well as push forward the development of sustainable mobility in China.”

In the Chinese mainland and Hong Kong, Volkswagen Group China and its two joint ventures, Shanghai Volkswagen and FAW-Volkswagen, handed over 898,400 (881,100, + 2.0 per cent) vehicles from January to March, including around 41,500 imported vehicles. In the month of March, Volkswagen Group China delivered 315,400 (317,200; – 0.6 per cent) new vehicles to customers.

With a total of 678,400 (682,700; – 0.6 per cent) units delivered to customers in the first three months, Volkswagen brand will continuously focus on quality of the cars and offer more fascinating models and derivatives to our Chinese customers.

Audi significantly exceeded its result from the previous quarter (+ 7.1 per cent) with 133,300 deliveries. In March deliveries of the brand in China increased by 1.5 per cent compared with the same month in 2014.

ŠKODA is also experiencing dynamic growth in China. The manufacturer’s deliveries increased 24.4 per cent to 25,200 vehicles in March on their strongest individual market (March 2014: 20,300). ŠKODA’s deliveries increased 15.6 per cent to 71,700 vehicles in the first quarter (January to March 2014: 62,000 vehicles). By the end of March, ŠKODA’s share of the Chinese market had risen to 1.47 per cent.

In the luxury segment, Lamborghini handed over 68 cars, and Bentley delivered over 300 units. The sports car manufacturer Porsche delivered a total of 13,300 cars with a strong growth of 34.4 per cent. Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles reported solid growth of 26.5 per cent in the first quarter of 2015, delivering around 1,000 units in the Chinese mainland and Hong Kong.