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Informist, Wednesday, Oct. 1, 2025

 

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--Maruti Suzuki: Have 250,000 pending bookings currently
--CONTEXT: Comments by Maruti Suzuki mgmt at virtual press conference
--Maruti Suzuki: Exported over 6,068 e Vitara units in Aug, Sept
--Maruti Suzuki: Victoris bookings over 25,000, waiting period over 10 wks
--Maruti Suzuki: Have huge lead in exports over our nearest competitor
--Maruti Suzuki:Expect pent-up demand seen Sept to moderate in coming months
--Maruti Suzuki: Seeing waiting period for certain small car variants
--Maruti Suzuki: Sept utility vehicle despatches low as many cars in transit

 

By Anand JC

 

NEW DELHI – Maruti Suzuki India Ltd. Wednesday said the company was working on plans to increase car production to meet demand, which has shot up after the cut in goods and services tax and buoyed by the festival season. "We are going to work on Sundays and some more holidays so as to ensure that we are able to serve the customers," the company's Senior Executive Officer for Marketing and Sales Partho Banerjee told reporters at a virtual press conference.

 

Data suggests the company has already stepped up its production. In September, the company manufactured 201,915 units, up over 26% on year and 27% on month. Passenger car bookings increased 28% on year in September and utility vehicle output grew 27%.

 

In September, the company received over 350,000 bookings and currently has over 250,000 bookings pending. The company registered record-high retail sales of 165,000 cars in the first eight days of Navratri, which Maruti Suzuki expects will hit 200,000 units in the coming two days. Maruti Suzuki received 700,530 enquiries in the last eight days. In contrast, the company had sold 85,000 in the Navratri of 2024.

 

Banerjee acknowledged that the company was seeing effects of customers holding back their decisions to buy cars in August, after Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced plans for reform in GST rates before Diwali festival. "This is pent-up demand (in September), it will come down a little bit in the subsequent months," Banerjee said.

 

Maruti Suzuki is facing logistical issues in delivering the cars to dealerships amid the sudden surge in demand. Many cars shipped by the company to dealerships on Sept. 22 are yet to reach their destination. Trailers delivering cars to the dealerships from the factories are expected to complete their delivery cycles in 20 days. The Fronx maker expects logistical difficulties to be normalised by Oct. 10.  

 

 

Despatches of sport utility vehicles, too, fell in September, in part due to logistical issues, Banerjee said. Retail sales of sport utility vehicles in September was 32% higher than the average monthly retail sales of these cars from April to August, Banerjee said. The company said response for its recently launched mid-sized sport utility vehicle Victoris has been very good. "We have more than 25,000 bookings for Victoris and the waiting period is to the tune of 10 weeks now," Banerjee said.

 

Maruti Suzuki, which is the market leader in the small car segment, was expected to be among the top beneficiaries of the tax rate cut. Banerjee said small cars have managed to buck the trend of being the lesser preferred option over utility vehicles. "We have got such good traction even in small cars, which people thought will not sell due to structural change (in demand pattern). Today, in some of the variants (of small cars), already the waiting period has started being quoted in the market," Banerjee said.

 

In September, the automaker had announced discounts on cars which exceeded the quantum of tax cuts to spur a "motorisation" trend in India. These offers were expected to lapse on Sept. 30 but the company has now extended them till Oct. 6.

 

Maruti Suzuki sold 132,820 passenger vehicles in India last month, 8% lower on year--mainly caused by the a 20?ll in utility vehicle despatches. However, it exported 42,204 units, up over 52% on year. In absolute terms, the number of cars exported by Maruti Suzuki was more than double that of Hyundai Motor India Ltd., the second on the list of top automobile exporters in India. The company exported just over 6,000 units of its electric sport utility vehicle e Vitara in August and September combined.

 

For the quarter ended June, the company had reported a net profit of INR 37.12 billion on a revenue of INR 384.14 billion. Wednesday, shares of Maruti Suzuki closed 0.4% lower at INR 15,965 on the National Stock Exchange.  End

 

Edited by Akul Nishant Akhoury

 

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