Sinotruk sales up 40% to 70,000 units in Jan.-June

Shanghai, July 3 (Gasgoo.com) By the end of June, both the output and sales of Chinese heavy-duty truck maker Sinotruk had exceeded 70,000 units in the first half of this year, achieving the sales revenue of 28.5 billion yuan ($4.16 billion) in the six months, up 40% from one year earlier, said Ma Chunji, Chairman of Sinotruk, to the Xinhua News Agency.

Since the beginning of 2008, China's heavy truck market has been blessed with unprecedented good opportunities. Sinotruk received 32,000 orders in March and 28,000 orders for its vehicles, but due to its limited capacity, Sinotruk could only make 15,000 heavy trucks each month at full capacity.

The China III emission standards began to take effect from July 1 this year. Sinotruk is the only one Chinese maker of heavy trucks who owns the "exhaust recycling system" engine, and this energy-efficiency engine will rapidly boost Sinotruk's market share.

Sinotruk sold more than 100,000 heavy-duty trucks in 2007 and aims to sell at least 130,000 units in 2008. In the recent few peak months, the average monthly sales of Sinotruk vehicles have hit 15,000 units, which means that it will be easy for the heavy-truck maker to achieve its sales goal this year. 

Shandong-based Sinotruk Ltd, ranked among the world's five biggest truck makers alongside Volvo, Daimler and Isuzu, aims to boost maximum capacity to more than 20,000 per month by 2009.