Jilin province Nov auto sales double to 124,000 units

Shanghai, December 29 (Gasgoo.com) Northeast China's Jilin province, home to Chinese auto giant FAW Group, sold 124,000 vehicles in November, up 101% from a year earlier, China Knowledge reported.

In the first 11 months, the province produced around 1.11 million autos, up 34.7% year on year, and sales soared 32.6% to 1.11 million units, meeting this year's sales target of 1 million vehicles one month ahead of schedule. Jilin's sedan output was 774,000 units in the 11-month period, up 36.6%, and sales grew 35.3% to 781,000 units.

In the Jan-Nov period, FAW-VW, a 50-50 joint venture between FAW Group and Volkswagen AG, sold a total of 616,509 Volkswagen cars and Audi cars, up 31.9% from a year earlier. The venture sold more than 390,000 VW cars and some 120,000 Audi cars in 2008.

FAW Jiefang Automobile Co Ltd, a medium-size and heavy truck producer in the province, sold 18,000 units in November. Sales for the first 11 months was 14.2% higher than the 134,000 units it sold in 2008.

In the first ten months, the gross output value of Jilin's auto industry was 248.54 billion yuan ($36.4 bln), up 14.7% year on year, sales revenue increased 5.5% to 210.56 billion yuan, and net profit hit 19.44 billion yuan, up 66%.

Auto industry is the mainstay industry of Jilin province. Its capital city Changchun now has about 320 auto and auto-parts manufacturers. Jilin aims to become China's largest auto production base by 2014, with an annual output of 1.8 million units.