VW group scales down market share target due to poor sales

Volkswagen has scaled down its target Indian market share it aims to achieve in 2018 from 20 per cent to 7-8 per cent and has attributed the change to poor sales. The German automaker despite having offerings in the highly competitive B-segment and C-segment has not been able to make headway against more established players like Hyundai and Maruti Suzuki.

Speaking to ET, Mahesh Koumudi, president and MD and of VW India said that the market environment in India was challenging and that they have been struggling to find the right product and cost structure. He further added that against initial expectations, Volkswagen brand had failed to get a major start due to heavy competition from more established players.

VW and Skoda, both the budget brands of the VW global umbrella have not fared well with VW experiencing multiple year declines while Skoda finished FY2014 with numbers lower than FY2011. Volkswagen is now believed to be working on multiple avenues like higher levels of localisation as well as new product launches. We believe that the latter will be an A-segment car while the higher levels of localisation are expected to include production of engine and transmission in India.

We expect that VW will increase the rate and number of products being exported in addition to the high levels of localisation from the Pune plant in a bid to boost its numbers.     

Source:ET