Great Wall Motors report a massive sales surge, while Geely falls short of yearly targets and loses over $100m through its Volvo unit
Great Wall Motor Co. announced that profits from the first nine months have risen over 50% year-on-year. Though the company didn't disclose exact profit or revenues, by the end of August sales had risen 44% to more than 199,000 units, according to industry analyst J.D. Power. Great Wall attributes the surge in profit to increased vehicle sales.
Meanwhile, Zhejiang Geely Holding Group Co. is struggling to reach annual sales targets despite a modest 6.6% rise in September. The Chinese automaker has only managed to sell 293,230 vehicles in the first nine months, making it unlikely to reach its 2011 sales goal of 480,000 units. Year-on-year sales for September were up only 0.5% from 2010.
Geely's Volvo unit has also reported losses of 738 million yuan ($116m) in the third quarter, due to negative currency effects and increased spending on technology. Nonetheless, Volvo was profitable in the first nine months and expects strong sales to yield a positive outcome for the year overall.
Volvo aims to double annual sales in China to 800,000 vehicles by 2020 to challenge other luxury car leaders like BMW, Audi AG and Mercedes Benz, and plans to invest around 70 billion yuan ($11bn) to garner its share of the coveted Chinese auto market.