India’s largest vehicle manufacturer, Maruti Suzuki, is forced to cut down its production for the eighth consecutive month following the lack of demand in the country. The firm produced only 119,337 of all vehicles in October this year, while last year, the numbers stood at 150,497.
Fall in demand caused a massive drop in production
The production of passenger vehicles experienced a fall from 148,318 in October 2018 to 117,383 units in October 2019. Concurrently, the vans slipped almost by half from 13,817 to 7,661.
- The manufacturing of the mini-segment vehicles such as Alto, Old WagonR, S-Presso, and more also dipped by 13,310 in the last month when compared to the previous year.
- Models like the New WagonR, Celerio, Swift, Baleno, Dzire, and more comprising the compact segment witnessed a down rate production from 74,167 to 64,079.
However, in contrast, utility vehicles, including Gypsy, Brezza, Ertiga, and SUVs, saw a slight increase numbering from 22,526 last year to 22,736 this year.
Festival season gave a little boost
Also, contradicting to the low production, the company did showcase an enhanced sales and signs of recovery owing to the festival season demand. Suzuki sold a total of 1,44,277 units during the last month in the domestic market, reporting a 4.5 percent growth the same month the previous year. While it testified a slump in sales of mini cars such as Alto and S-Presso, the compact segment including New WagonR, Celerio, Ignis, Swift, Baleno, and Dzire posted a growth of 16 percent year-over-year.
In September this year, the whole automobile economy experienced a steep fall in the sales as the stocks glided by 5%. The S&P BSE Auto Index revealed a fall of 0.7%.
