Despite prolonged protests and cloudy economic prospects, the German luxury automaker BMW Group Thailand expects sales to remain buoyant this year.
Executives of BMW Group Thailand gather together for a photo shoot during the car maker’s recent press conference held to announce the company’s third consecutive year of record sales in 2013.
The company yesterday reported record sales in 2013, with 8,147 BMW and Mini vehicle deliveries.
It posted an increase of 33% growth from the previous record year, 2012, to mark the second-highest growth rate within BMW Group worldwide.
All three business units achieved record-sales — BMW Automobiles with 7,536 deliveries (up by 34% from 2012), Mini with 611 deliveries (up by 22%) and BMW Motorrad with 400 deliveries (up by 38%),the company said in a statement.
"2013 marked a great year for BMW Group, with record-breaking performance worldwide, in addition to our equally record-breaking performance here in Thailand,’’ said the statement.
BMW Group strengthened its position as the global leader in premium vehicles, achieving almost 2 million BMW, Mini and Rolls-Royce vehicle deliveries, a 6.4% surge in our worldwide sales from the previous record year,’’ said Matthias Pfalz, the president of BMW Group Thailand.
“In Thailand, we continued our success with an increase of more than 33% for BMW and Mini vehicles sold, despite headwinds, with a total of 8,147 vehicle sales, and a 38% increase in BMW Motorrad sales. This marks the highest sales in our company’s history.”
BMW Group Thailand did not reveal the sales target in 2014, but Mr Pfalz said sales have increased on average 20-25% for a couple of years, and the company will try to maintain such growth momentum this year.
"We continue to grow despite headwinds in the industry. BMW Group believes in the potential of Thailand and has expanded investment in our assembly pipeline over the past year. This means our Rayong plant is the only site within our BMW global production network that produces vehicles for all three of our brands, making it one of the most efficient and flexible assembly plants in the world,’’ said Mr Pfalz.
"The BMW Manufacturing plant is now ready to expand its production capabilities to cover BMW 1 Series, BMW 3 Series Gran Turismo, and the all-new BMW X5 as the latest additions to our existing BMW, Mini Countryman and BMW F800R assembly lines.’’
However, for overall luxury car sales, BMW forecasts luxury cars will be 20,000 vehicles, up from 18,000 last year and 15,200 in 2012.