Dongfeng Motor hits 2010 target 40 days early

Hubei-based Dongfeng Motor Corp, one of China's top-four auto groups, reported year-to-date sales of 2.28 million vehicles by Nov 21, meeting its full-year goal 40 days ahead of schedule.

The company planned to move 2.22 million vehicles in 2010 after selling 1.9 million vehicles last year.

Dongfeng said its delivery of commercial vehicles this year increased 48 percent on an annual basis to nearly 560,000 units by Nov 21, and sales of passenger cars rose 39 percent to 1.72 million units.

The company attributed the achievements to its succesful commercial vehicle business and a diverse product portfolio of passenger cars.

Dongfeng is the Chinese partner of Japan's Nissan Motor, Honda Motor, South Korea's Kia Motors as well as France's PSA Peugeot-Citroen.

According to its statement, sales at these joint ventures all registered robust growth throughout the year.

Dongfeng's passenger car joint venture with Nissan sold 589,000 cars by Nov 21, up 29 percent from a year ago.

Its partnership with PSA Peugeot-Citroen moved 320,000 cars during the same period, 40 percent more than a year earlier.

Sales of Dongfeng Honda increased 27 percent to 233,000 units.

And delivery of Dongfeng Yueda Kia jumped 45 percent to 289,000.

Dongfeng said that it always focuses on raising profitability instead of merely expanding business scale, which also contributed to its quality growth.

In September, Dongfeng for the first time joined the Fortune 500 list, on which it ranks 182nd.

The company released a plan in August to invest 3 billion yuan over the next five years to develop energy-saving and new-energy vehicles.

Production and sales of new-energy and energy-saving vehicles is expected to account for a fifth of Dongfeng-brand passenger vehicles by 2015.