Visitors stand by automobiles on the Audi company stand at the Auto Mobil International (AMI) trade fair, at Leipziger Messe in Leipzig, Germany. Audi posted its fifth double-digit percentage sales rise in six months in May, supporting its bid for the global luxury car-sales crown in a tightening race with rival BMW.
Reuters/Berlin
Audi posted its fifth double-digit percentage sales rise in six months in May, supporting its bid for the global luxury car-sales crown in a tightening race with German rival BMW.
Deliveries at Volkswagen’s flagship division rose 10.8% last month to 152,000 cars on surging US demand, extending five-month sales to 713,900, the world’s No 2 luxury automaker said yesterday.
Germany’s three leading premium carmakers have been closing ranks in 2014. Audi narrowed the four-month sales gap to BMW by a fifth this year to 7,200 cars, from 9,021 a year ago. Its own lead over third-placed Mercedes-Benz shrank 11% to 54,547 autos.
Mercedes will publish May deliveries on Friday and BMW is expected to release the data next week.
“It’s a tug-of-war for the crown between Audi and BMW and they’re battling it out with somewhat ageing lineups,” said Stefan Bratzel, head of the Center of Automotive Management think-tank near Cologne.
Audi is aiming to “clearly” exceed last year’s record 1.58mn sales this year while BMW is pushing deliveries to 2mn or more, after selling a record 1.96mn in 2013.
Analysts say the strongest sales momentum rests with Mercedes this year, which is benefiting from a spate of redesigned models such as the A- and B-Class compacts.
Audi’s US deliveries jumped by a quarter in May, extending year-to-date gains in the world’s second-largest auto market to 11.4% or 67,482 cars.
That’s in stark contrast to parent VW, whose core passenger-car brand is grappling with a 11.5% decline in five-month US deliveries in a growing market.
