Despite an estimated growth of only 8% for the Chinese market in 2015, Daimler targets a faster growth in China than the premium market in 2015.
Mercedes-Benz is on the way to success. 2014 was the fourth year in a row with worldwide record sales increasing by 12.9% to 1,650,010 units. Mercedes registered the best results in China in terms of sales growing. The German luxury carmaker sold, last year, 281,588 units in China, which represents a 29.1% increase. This is the highest growth on Chinese market, where Mercedes is still struggling to catch up with Audi and BMW. With this very good result on Chinese market, China overtook Germany as the second most important market for Mercedes-Benz.
For this reason, Daimler will boost local production of Mercedes-Benz vehicles in China and continue its dealer network expansion, as it targets growth of at least 10% in 2015, said Hubertus Troska, Daimler chief for China, quoted by Automotive News.
In the past few years, Mercedes enlarged the dealer network with 100 new locations. This year, the growth rate will not be at a level of two dealers per week any more, but Daimler will look to plug the holes in the existing network, particularly in less-developed cities in the west of the country.
Troska stated that “Daimler will grow faster than the premium market this year”, German news agency dpa reported.
To meet these targets, Daimler plans to substantially increase local production according to Dieter Zetsche, Daimler CEO.
Daimler has already spent 112 million euros on its Beijing Research and Development Center to adapt the locally built models to customer demands in China.
