Bajaj Auto sees robust sales for March; export markets doing well: Ravikumar

Domestic two-wheeler sales were a cause of worry couple of months back but with new Discover twins, the sales went up to 27000 units this month, said Ravikumar. Moreover, with refreshed Avengers and Cruise 220 the numbers are ticking higher.

He is confident of domestic motorcycle sales touching 2 lakh units per month going forward.

Below is the verbatim transcript of the interview.

Sonia: Another good set of numbers coming in. Can you tell us what the trend is looking like for the months of March and April?

A: I would think the trend should certainly continue. For the second month running, it is 3,40,000 plus type of a number that we have reported and in March also we should certainly cross that 3,50,000 plus.

Sonia: Where are you seeing the biggest pick up in terms of exports and domestic?

A: This is absolutely working out to plan and for the last few months when we are telling you that 145-150 range is what we will deliver, that is happening very nicely.

Almost, all the markets – Africa has done very nicely, Bangladesh has done, Nepal is doing well, Philippines is doing well, new markets are adding good numbers, so Latin America is a bit soft and that is where Columbia is one dull spot but one like that is quite okay and Sri Lanka is the government related story there.

Latha: Let me come to the basic overall numbers. 3.57 lakh in what is actually a month where you have much fewer working days, 10 percent fewer working days is an outstanding performance, what would you attribute it to, is it that there is a latent demand, which is definitely kicking up, is that in the domestic space, just give us some colour about how this came about?

A: Number one is – if you talk one by one, the star performer continues to be the domestic commercial vehicles. Again almost more than 38,000 numbers and the going has been strong on the back of all this permit releases, which we have talked about in the past, Maharashtra, Delhi. So that is continuing well, it will continue for some more time.

The second thing is again exports robust, steady waters, good numbers will keep kicking in month after month, that is panning out to plan. As far as domestic motorcycles is concerned, there has been a cause of worry for us a couple of months back. Now with the Discover twins that have been launched, in the month of February itself, we have build-out almost about some 27,000 units in domestic and with Avengers were refreshed and the Cruise 220 is taking the market very nicely, people are liking it a lot and there again the numbers are kicking in.

In fact, in both Discovers and Avengers, we have not percolated all of the market and I think the story will be clear not even the next month, it may take two more months for the things to be cleared and till that time certainly both these brands are going to see incremental volumes coming in. So I think our product actions have held on very nicely. New products, which we added are giving in extra numbers and that scenario will continue for some more time.

Sonia: Couple of months ago, in the month of September, you had hit a runrate of almost 2.8 lakh units in domestic, given that the new products are doing very well, do you think you can hit this runrate once again?

A: September-October whenever you speak, they were all the peak months, the Diwali and stocking up and all that happens but I think these numbers today are good to take us to 2 lakh plus domestic motorcycles per month.