Kia, MG Join The List Of Top 10 Best-Selling Carmakers With Maruti, Hyundai & More

Let’s see how various carmakers have fared despite the ongoing downturn in the automotive sector

The Indian automotive industry has been experiencing a slowdown this year and the sales numbers for the month of October have been released, which was also the time of auspicious festivals in the country. Since this is the mid-point of the 2019-2020 financial year, it is a good time to analyse and compare the year-on-year sales figures of India’s top carmakers.

Let’s see how all of them have been faring, who’s floating and who’s struggling in this turbulent time:

Takeaways

• Maruti recorded a positive year-on-year growth despite the slowdown. The carmaker has introduced a host of new and updated models in the past six months, such as the S-Presso and XL6. It is even more impressive considering that Maruti announced plans to discontinue offering diesel variants altogether post April 2020.

• Hyundai seems to be holding their own through the downturn period with new models like the Venue and Grand i10 Nios. It has the least negative year-on-year growth of the mass carmakers mentioned above.

• Toyota is the next-best performer in terms of year-on-year sales comparison, with just a six per cent drop in sales. The brand’s only new model this financial year has been the Maruti Baleno badged as the Glanza hatchback.

• Mahindra has suffered a 23 per cent loss in terms of year-on-year growth this October, i.e., over 5,500 units less. Tata also suffered a drop of over 5,000 fewer units sold in October 2019 as compared to October 2018, suggesting that the brand has also been struggling during this industry downturn.

• The biggest increase was recorded by Renault, a 63 per cent growth for year-on-year sales figures in October 2019. The current numbers were likely helped by the recent launches of the Kwid facelift, Duster facelift and Triber. 

• Honda recorded a nearly 30 per cent drop in sales while Ford witnessed a 22 per cent drop in year-on-year sales.

Newcomers MG Motor and Kia are enjoying impressive sales numbers in October 2019 with just one SUV each - the MG Hector and the Kia Seltos. The smaller Seltos puts Kia fifth overall while the Hector is ahead of the likes of Volkswagen, Skoda, Nissan and others.