On Thursday, General Motors reported global sales of 9,025,942 units in 2011, up 7.6% over 2010, which makes it the world’s largest automaker in terms of volume.
Earlier this month, the Volkswagen Group announced that it sold a total of 8.16 million vehicles, up 14.3 percent compared to the previous year, which puts the German automaker in second spot – or so we thought.
You see, today, Volkswagen is questioning GM’s numbers and of course its crown as the bestselling automotive group in the world. According to a report from The Wall Street Journal, the German company argues that unlike GM, it’s numbers don’t include sales of its affiliates such as MAN SE and Scania AB, in which VW has majority-ownership stakes.
It is estimated that the two truck makers could add about 200,000 to the VW Group’s output lifting the total to around 8.36 million units for 2011.
And since 9 million continues to be larger than 8.36 million, WSJ cites the Detroit maker’s rivals claims about GM’s numbers being hugely boosted by ownership stakes in China’s SAIC MotorCorp. and Liuzhou Wuling Motors Co – the latter for example, is said to have sold some 1.2 million low cost commercial vehicles in China.
The newspaper says that some analysts don’t include Wuling’s sales in GM’s output as it does not have a controlling stake in the company. “We have to draw the line somewhere and this at least gives us some consistency around the globe,” said forecasting firm LMC Automotive analyst, Jeff Schuster.
The sales number brawl doesn’t end with GM and VW as the report from WSJ also questions the Toyota Group’s third place with 7.91 million units in 2011 given that the Renault Group and Nissan Motors, which effectively operate as one and are run by a single CEO, post separate sales.
If you were to combine their sales along with Russia’s AvtoVAZ in which Renault holds a 25% stake, the alliances sales would reach 8.03 million and top those of Toyota.
At the end of the day of course, what every carmaker should be looking at is how high their profits are and not their sales.
Story References: Wall Street Journal
