PSA Peugeot-Citroen’s standalone premium brand, DS, is targeting sales in Iran and plans to open a store in Tehran “in the next few days”, according to DS CEO Yves Bonnefont.
Bonnefont told just-auto in Paris that he sees a great opportunity for DS in Iran because a number of Iranian customers are particularly attracted to French style. “We believe this is a significant segment in Iran,” he said. “We are very happy that we could be the first premium brand to be back on the market.”
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With the lifting of Western sanctions on Iran over its nuclear program, some auto companies are eyeing doing business in a market starved of international product. PSA has a history of involvement in the Iranian auto industry, including the setting up of manufacturing operations on some models working with the major local producer, IKCO .
Bonnefont also emphasised the importance of China to the DS brand’s development.
“We are building the brand with two pillars: one is Europe, one is China. And then we have set our international development plan around the top 200 cities in the world. We are very systematic in opening DS stores in those cities.”
However, he also said that he doesn’t want to go “too fast”. “I don’t want us to be stretched. We should concentrate on our core markets, establish the brand – and we know that takes some time – and then do things progressively. Iran is a great opportunity, we catch the opportunity and we will see how it works out. We are full of hope.”
Bonnefont also said there are no specific plans to take the DS brand to North America.
He was speaking to just-auto at an event at the Paris Louvre to reveal the latest DS 3 model (it has been facelifted and completes the re-branding of the line-up from ‘Citroen DS’ to standalone ‘DS’).
Last year DS sales were 102,000 units. Asked about where he believed DS sales should settle in the future, Bonnefont said that it was important “not to manage the DS brand by volume.” He added that the priority is to position the brand where it should be, “so that our customers are proud to be owning a DS.” He also said that it might make sense, in the long-term – 10-15 years out – for DS to take ‘around 10%’ (last year was 3.5%) of all PSA global car sales.
