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Maruti Suzuki India said on Monday it expects to double its exports to about 1.6 lakh units this fiscal, while it is aiming over 20 per cent growth in its overall sales. "Last fiscal we exported 80,000 units.
"We are expecting 100 per cent growth in export this fiscal," Maruti Suzuki India executive officer, marketing and sales, Mayank Pareekh, told reporters on the sidelines of an AIMA event in New Delhi.
The company's overseas sales growth was driven mainly by the export of its flagship model A-Star, which clocked sales of over one lakh units till December 2010, within 11 months of launch.
MSI aims to cross the two lakh units of exports by 2010-11. The A-star, which is produced only in the company's Manesar facility, is exported primarily to Europe and other countries such Chile, Angola, Saudi Arabia, Morocco, Algeria and the UAE, where it is sold as Suzuki Celerio.
It also contract manufactures the model for Japanese car major Nissan, which sells it in the European market as Pixo.
Recently, MSI had kick started exporting its latest model Ritz to South East Asia as well to expand its export portfolio, besides exploring the West Asian market.
Commenting on the overall sales growth of the company, Pareekh said: "So far on an average we have been growing at about 20-22 per cent this fiscal and we expect this to continue and overall for the entire fiscal we expect this level of growth."
MSI had sold over 8 lakh units, of which domestic market contributed 7,22,000 units, Pareekh said.
"We will produce a million units this fiscal and of course we will try to sell this within the year. . . So far, we have sold about 8.4 lakh units this fiscal," he said. The company has rationalised and reactivated its capacities and 'currently we are producing at peak of our level', he said.
On rising commodity prices, Pareekh said it is still going up and pressure on margins continued. He, however, declined to comment if MSI would look for another round of price hike.
"As a company policy at first we try to absorb it. In January we increased prices by less than one per cent."
On Budget expectations, he said the government should continue with the policies that helped the auto industry to grow at about 21 per cent in the last 12 months.
"It will be too early to exit from stimulus measures as those were the main reasons of growth for the industry. It is too early to to say that the auto industry has fully recovered (from the slump due to global economic crisis)," he said.