Summary: Sedan sales in China in 2016 Q1

Gasgoo.com (Shanghai) - Sedan sales in China fell 9.5% during the first quarter of this year, statistics from Gasgoo.com (Chinese) show. That rate is a lot less favorable than the 8.9% growth the market as a whole has been able to achieve over the same time period. At the same time, sedans’ market share also fell 10.5 percentage points to just 51.5%.

German manufacturers still lead the sedan market by a healthy margin, while domestic own brand manufacturers’ sedan sales managed to overtake those of Japanese manufacturers. However, in terms of sales growth, own brand manufacturers performed the worst, with their sedan sales falling 3.2% year-on-year. By comparison, sales of German and Japanese sedan grew 3.5% and 2.9%, respectively.

Shanghai VW still continues to lead the sedan market in China, followed in turn by fellow ‘Big Three’ automotive companies FAW-VW and Shanghai GM. These three JVs accounted for 41.3% of all sedan sales made in the country, with both VW-affiliated enterprises performing especially strongly. The only two own brand manufacturers to crack the top ten were Geely and Changan. The two manufacturers’ performance was commendable considering that own brands as a whole have been turning their focus towards the much more lucrative SUV segment.

German models were particularly successful this quarter, with four of the best selling sedan models this quarter being of German brands. Two Japanese models and two US models also made the charts, while only a single own brand model, Geely’s Emgrand EC7, managed to rank in the top ten. The top three consisted of the VW Lavida, VW Sagitar and Buick Excelle, with the Excelle’s sales over tripling from the previous year. The Corolla and Excelle also posted strong sales growth rates of 59.8% and 24.7%, respectively.