Volkswagen aims to boost car sales in southeast Asia to 280,000 units by 2015 as it diversifies from reliance on sated western markets and as a China boom slows, Reuters reported, citing a German newspaper.
Go deeper with GlobalData
Discover B2B Marketing That Performs
Combine business intelligence and editorial excellence to reach engaged professionals across 36 leading media platforms.
A spokesman for Europe’s biggest carmaker reportedly confirmed a report in the Braunschweiger Zeitung that VW intended to conquer the southeast Asian market by 2015.
According to Reuters, citing an internal strategy document, the paper said sales in Europe, China and South America should be stabilised during that period.
“Saturated markets in western Europe force the Volkswagen group to develop the potential of markets that have been hardly tapped until now,” the paper quoted the study as saying.
The report said VW was not doing justice to its role as a global player by selling just 2,574 cars a year in the region, in which the car market exceeds 1.4 million vehicles.
It suggested building production facilities in the region, developing special vehicles with that market in mind and building up local cooperation deals, Reuters said, noting that VW and Malaysia’s Proton Holdings last month unveiled an accord to assemble Volkswagen cars in Malaysia for sale in southeast Asia.
Russia and India are also promising growth markets, the newspaper report said, according to the news agency.
