MG car sales in Jan-May are far from target

Shanghai, July 21 (Gasgoo.com) The sales of the MG brand cars of Nanjing Auto, now a subsidiary of SAIC, only reached 1,900 units in the January to May period, less than 400 units a month on average, with a meager profit of 0.7%, said China Business News today. This sales volume is far from the target of 5,000 units in the first half of 2008 set by SAIC at the beginning of this year.

"Some parts of the sales performance have not met the progress requirements," said Chen Zhixin, general manager of Nanjing Auto and executive vice president of SAIC, who managed to look calm in public interviews though he felt quite uncomfortable about this sales figure of the MG brand over the past five months.

About half a year after SAIC acquired Nanjing Auto, the management of the Chinese car-making giant based in Shanghai is beginning to feel the growing burden of its Nanjing facility's major passenger vehicle brand MG. Whether or not to develop the MG as a priority brand poses a big question to the SAIC executive team.

On July 22, 2005, the Nanjing Automobile Group purchased the remaining assets, including the MG brand, of British MG Rover Group for £53 million. The Nanjing Auto and SAIC Motor announced a long-expected merger at the beginning of this year.