Auto India, Car India

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The sales results of Tata Motors were declared yesterday and the company can heave a sigh of relief. The car sales across the country showed signs of gloom in the month of October and was the worst ever in the last ten years and even Tata Motors could not do anything to avoid it. However, the sales figures of luxury cars and commercial vehicles have not been much affected.

Tata buses and trucks hold about 60 percent of the market share. The sales of these vehicles increased by 130,126 units, or 17.7 percent, in the past one year. Although the sales of commercial vehicles are not very often in the news, their contribution to the annual growth of the company is quite significant. Last month the sales of the car dipped significantly, but the sales of commercial vehicles dipped by two to three percent.

The profits (before tax deduction) declined by 93 percent. It went down from $109m to $7.5m in the past quarter. Its revenue rose by fifteen percent. The company says that this could be attributed to the decrease in the value of rupee against dollar. This depreciation caused a loss of $58.5m to the company.

However, the best thing that the company did in the past few years was to take over Jaguar Land Rover in 2008 for $2.3b. Although the brand was on a decline in its home, UK, its sales in Russia, China and India have been quite satisfactory. In fact, the profits (before tax deduction) increased by 8.4 percent, and the revenues increased by 30 percent. These figures helped in balancing the loss incurred by the company when the sales of its passenger cars declined.

The profits of the company look quite satisfactory as compared to its biggest competitor, Maruti Suzuki the biggest rival of the company that has the largest share in the car market in the country. The profits of Maruti Suzuki nosedived by more than 50 percent because of the prolonged strike at its Manesar plant.

Although the initial sales of the much hyped car Nano was not a success, it sold close to four thousand units in October and its sales increased by 26 percent. The Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers report that the sales and production of cars in the country fell significantly. However, this has not been so bad for Tata Motors, in spite of the fact that the company had to deal with global increase in the prices in the prices of steel and rubber.