Short Torque

New record

US carmaker General Motors' China sales surged by 77.7 percent year-on-year to 144,593 vehicles in July, marking a new monthly record.

For the first seven months of this year, sales of GM China and its joint ventures jumped 42.8 percent to 959,035 vehicles. Its passenger car tie-up with SAIC Motor Corp, Shanghai GM sold 56,489 vehicles in July, up 60.6 percent from a year ago. And sales of its other mini bus joint venture SAIC-GM-Wuling, nearly doubled to 87,925 units last month.

Kevin Wale, GM's China chief, said the automaker and its two joint ventures in China will continue to launch a range of new products in coming months to attract local buyers.

Trade of stake

BYD, an emerging Chinese carmaker listed in Hong Kong, completed its deal to sell a 10 percent stake to Warren Buffett at the end of last month after it was approved by the China Securities Regulatory Commission. According to the deal, Buffett's investment firm MidAmericanEnergy bought 225 million new H-shares of BYD. BYD is to appoint David Sokol, president of MidAmericanEnergy, as its non-executive director.

In the first half of this year, BYD's sales surged by 176 percent year-on-year to 176,795 units. The company aims to move 400,000 vehicles for the whole year.

New acquisition

Beijing Automotive Industry Holding Corp recently agreed to buy a 40 percent stake of Sino-German joint venture Fujian Daimler Automotive Co from its Chinese parent Fujian Motor Industry Corp pending government approval. It is estimated that Beijing Automotive will pay 700 to 800 million yuan for the deal. As a result, Fujian Motor's share in the joint venture will decline to 10 percent from 50 percent. Daimler AG's 50 percent stake in the venture will remain unchanged.

Fujian Daimler was set up in 2007 with an investment of 208 million euros. It plans to produce Mercedes-Benz medium and high-end wagons this year, including the Viano Vito and Sprinter.

Customer satisfaction

Guangqi Honda, a joint venture between Honda and Guangzhou Automobile Group Co Ltd, ranks highest in customer satisfaction with authorized dealer after-sales service, according to JD Power Asia Pacific China customer service study. Scoring a total 870 points on a 1,000-point scale, the joint venture performs particularly well in all five key factors that were surveyed: service quality, vehicle pickup, service initiation, service advisor and service facility.

Guangqi Honda now has 450 authorized sales shops across the country serving almost 1.7 million customers. The company's January-July sales rose by 14.4 percent to 195,749 vehicles from a year ago.

Sales growth

Dongfeng Motor Corp, China's third-biggest automotive group, moved 800,810 vehicles in the first half of this year, jumping 11.51 percent from a year ago. Meanwhile, the company's sales revenue grew by almost 8 percent to 107.26 billion yuan.

Dongfeng Nissan, the group's joint venture with Japan's Nissan Motor Co, sold 225,100 passenger cars in the first six month, up 41.3 percent. Dongfeng's other joint ventures with PSA Peugeot Citroen, Honda and Kia all posted robust sales growth in the period.

For the full of this year, the group, parent of Hong Kong-listed Dongfeng Motor (Group) Co Ltd, aims to sell 1.4 million vehicles and achieve sales revenue of more than 200 billion yuan.

Fuel prices drop

China cut gasoline and diesel prices by 220 yuan per ton, or 3 percent, on July 29 to reflect the drop in international crude prices. This equals price cut of 0.16 yuan per liter in gasoline prices and 0.19 yuan per liter in diesel prices. It is the second price cut on fuel prices this year.

China adopted a new oil pricing system earlier this year under which domestic fuel prices would be adjusted when the moving average of a basket of international crude (Brent, Dubai and Cinta) changes more than 4 percent over a period of 22 working days.

(China Daily 08/10/2009 page8)