Moneycontrol Bureau
Shares of Tata Motors rose 3 percent intraday on Monday despite China slowdown amidst weak market condition. The four-wheeler major is riding high on its British subsidiary- Jaguar Land Rover’s strong sales in December and overall performance in December. In December, JLR global retail sales saw a growth of 20 percent annually at 49553. Jaguar sales rose 20 percent (Y-o-Y) at 838 2units while Landrover sales grew 20 percent (Y-o-Y) at 41171 units.
Strong growth was registered in Europe, North America and UK driven by success of new models like Discovery Sport and Jaguar XE. Though sales in China was down 10 percent (Y-o-Y) at 10403 units , it has quite improved from low of 5409 units in Aug to 10403 units in Dec 2015.
Meanwhile, JLR has achieved a record global sales in 2015 with the premium luxury vehicles' manufacturer retailing 4, 87,065 vehicles, its highest figure yet and a five per cent increase from previous year.
The record-breaking sales figure came despite a slowdown in China with Britain overtaking Beijing as the luxury car brand's most important market. The two brands together sold more than 1,00,000 vehicles in the UK in a calendar year for the first time last year, which included a 30 per cent increase in British sales of Jaguar, much of it attributable to the launch of the XE.
Last year, sales in China slumped by 24 per cent to 92,474, as a result of a slowdown in what is among the world's fastest growing automotive market.
Europe was the company's largest sales region in 2015 with sales of 110,298, up 28 per cent year on year; and with a growth of 21 per cent over 2014 figures, a total of 100,636 Jaguars and Land Rovers were bought by customers in the UK.
Andy Goss, Jaguar Land Rover's group sales operations director, said the new figures meant that the group had doubled sales since 2009 because of new launches.
The group said that US sales were up by 25 per cent while sales in Europe -- where Jaguar Land Rover has traditionally struggled in markets such as Germany -- rose by 28 per cent.
Highlights from 2015 saw Land Rover sell more than 4,00,000 vehicles for first time, a 6 per cent increase compared to 2014 and Jaguar achieve its best performance in a decade with sales of 83,986 vehicles, a 3 per cent rise. Land Rover's new Discovery Sport, which replaced the Freelander2, proved a hit with sales of more than 10,000 a month, second only to the best-selling Range Rover Evoque.
At 13:48 hrs Tata Motors was quoting at Rs 361.80, up Rs 8.35, or 2.36 percent on the BSE.(With inputs from PTI)
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