The Hindu Business Line : Vehicle production may touch 10.9 million in 2006

According to the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM), the automobile industry is expected to register a total production of around 10.9 million vehicles in the calendar year January to December 2006 and witness a production growth of 17 per cent. This is up from 14.5 per cent growth witnessed in 2005 over calendar year 2004.

The growth in 2006 has been driven by increased sales of passenger vehicles, commercial vehicles and motorcycles.

The cumulative growth of passenger vehicles is expected to be almost 19 per cent during the calendar year. This is in contrast to less than 7 per cent growth witnessed in 2005 over 2004. Passenger cars are expected to grow at around 20.5 per cent compared to 12.1 per cent for utility vehicles and 16 per cent in multi-purpose vehicles.

Within the passenger car category, the compact, mid-size and executive segment cars drove sales.

While mini-car (consisting of the Maruti 800) sales registered a dip of 7.2 per cent, premium car sales were down 5.6 per cent in the year. On the other hand, compact car sales surged by 25.3 per cent, midsize cars by 18.9 per cent and executive segment cars by 32.9 per cent.

Commercial vehicles

Meanwhile, overall commercial vehicle sales are expected to grow at 30 per cent with both medium and heavy CVs and light CVs growing by around 30 per cent. However, it is expected that while the goods carriers will be growing at around 34-35 per cent, the passenger carrier segment is not keeping pace with the overall growth and expected to be only around 5-7 per cent.

According to SIAM, the Supreme Court verdict on overloading may have given a boost to the growth and demand for high tonnage vehicles. Also, at the lower end, small transport vehicles have created a new space for themselves and expanded the market in a new direction.

Overall, the two-wheeler market has grown by 15 per cent in January to December 2006 over the same period last year. Motorcycles are expected to clock a growth of over 17 per cent, while scooters and mopeds would grow by 4-5 per cent.

Three-wheeler sales have been encouraging this year (expected to grow at around 20 per cent).

Overall automobile exports are expected to register a 25 per cent growth in the calendar year 2006 over the last calendar year.

Passenger vehicle export is expected to be more than 1,90,000 in 2006 registering a growth of 11.7 per cent.