Automakers in Japan are rapidly recovering from the massive earthquake and tsunami on 11 March with Nissan Motor and Suzuki Motor expecting to set new record highs for global vehicle sales in fiscal 2011, according to consolidated business forecasts released by six major carmakers by Thursday.
While four manufacturers are forecasting global sales gains for the year to 31 March, 2012, Toyota and Honda are anticipating declines as they have been slower than their rivals in recovering from supply chain disruptions following the catastrophe, Kyodo News said.
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Nissan expects to sell 4.6m vehicles worldwide in fiscal 2011, an all-time high and up 9.9% year on year, while Suzuki is forecasting a rise of 6.7% to 2,819,000 vehicles, the highest level on record, thanks to brisk sales in emerging economies such as India.
Mitsubishi Motors and Mazda Motor are also projecting increased global unit sales.
Japanese automakers were earlier forecast to return to normal production levels after October. But Nissan already raised its output to the previous year’s level in May while Suzuki is planning to increase production on a year-to-year basis, starting in August, Kyodo noted.
Mitsubishi in May began to roll out more cars than planned before the disaster and Mazda ‘normalised’ manufacturing operations earlier this month.
The combined global automobile sales projected by the six carmakers total 20,339,000 units, up 2.2% from the previous year.
Strong demand for motor vehicles overseas is also contributing to the bullish projection.
In value terms, Nissan is projecting sales of JPY9.4 trillion, up 7.1%, but anticipating a 15.4% decline in net profit to JPY270bn due to the effects of a strong yen and high materials costs.
Suzuki is expecting a 10.7% increase in net profit to JPY50bn on sales of JPY2.61 trillion, up 0.1%.
But Toyota is forecasting a 31.4% fall in net profit to JPY280bn and Honda is anticipating a 63.5% decline to JPY195bn.
Mitsubishi is forecasting increased profit and sales while Mazda expects to climb back into the black with a net profit of JPY1bn, compared with a loss of JPY60bn yen the previous year.
Fuji Heavy Industries, maker of Subaru cars, will release its business forecast on 6 July. Kyodo added.
