Volkswagen deliveries to China up 8.7 pct y-o-y in Jan.-July

BERLIN, Aug. 13 (Xinhua) -- Germany's largest carmaker Volkswagen said on Friday that its deliveries to China rose 8.7 percent year-on-year and reached 2.08 million units in the period from January to July 2021.

In July, the Volkswagen group delivered 238,100 vehicles to China, its largest single market, down 27.5 percent compared to the same month last year, according to the company.

"Despite the heavy shortage in chip supplies, Volkswagen Group models and the Volkswagen brand remained the No. 1 choice of Chinese customers in July," a Volkswagen spokesperson told Xinhua.

Due to the semiconductor supply shortage, Volkswagen Group China was "temporarily unable to match production to the high customer demand," the spokesperson added. The company expected the overall semiconductor supply situation to "gradually improve by the end of the year."

While global sales recovered by 19.2 percent to nearly 5.7 million units between January and July, deliveries in July declined 18.7 percent year-on-year to 720,200 vehicles, according to Volkswagen.

All of the group's brands reported declining deliveries in July. Sales of Skoda fell 30.9 percent to 75,000 units. The group's core brand, Volkswagen, delivered 379,200 passenger cars in July, 21.6 percent less than in the same month last year.

The decline in sales of luxury brands Audi and Porsche, which have been less affected by the COVID-19 pandemic so far, was 8.9 and 6.9 percent, respectively, in July.

In its financial report for the first half of the year, Volkswagen lowered its forecast for deliveries in 2021 but still expected them to be "noticeably up on the previous year amid continued challenging market conditions."