Fiat expects all five of its car brands to increase sales next year thanks to new models and a healthier business, managers reportedly said on Thursday.
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Alfa Romeo, Fiat’s worst performing brand, expects sales to leap by 20 to 30% in 2006 as its new Brera sportscar and 159 saloon hit the market, brand manager Antonio Baravalle said.
“From the commercial point of view, 2005 will be a transition, and we’ll start harvesting the fruit of our labour next year,” Baravalle told Reuters at the Bologna Motor Show.
Reuters noted that Alfa Romeo, famed for its Spider convertible and distinctive V-shaped grilles, has long been seen as Fiat’s most underused asset as an ageing line-up lost ground to Mercedes, BMW and even the new Volkswagen Golf.
Fiat chief executive Sergio Marchionne has said that revitalising Alfa Romeo is one of his top priorities, to be achieved partly with new models and by working more closely with Maserati, the report added.
Fiat Auto is battling to pull back to profit next year after a sales slump dragged it into crisis in 2001/2002 and is pumping out new models to lure buyers back to the Italian brand, Reuters said.
In September, the new version of Fiat’s best-selling Punto went on sale, and brand manager Luca De Meo told the news agency it had notched up 60,000 orders so far. Fiat aims to gather 80,000 Punto orders by the end of 2005 and sell 360,000 annually from then on.
De Meo reportedly said Fiat, Alfa Romeo and Lancia together had taken their best market share in two years in November while the Fiat badge had put in the best showing in three and a half years.
Maserati expects to sell 5,700 units this year against 4,600 in 2004, thanks to its new Quattroporte saloon, and will grow further next year, brand manager Karl-Heinz Kalbfell told Reuters.
Kalbfell, who manages the Maserati-Alfa Romeo partnership, reportedly said Fiat still planned to return Alfa Romeo to the US market but that no dates had been fixed.
One of Ferrari’s top managers said Fiat’s sportiest marque expected to sell more than 5,000 units in 2005, a new record, the report added.
