Lamborghini Model Production : 2020-21

As a marque that goes head to head with Ferrari, it has to have a point of difference to be relevant. For me, it's a more flamboyant, ostentatious style that defines it and gives that unique appeal. It's not something I'd ever go for but some do.

Production dropped 16% in 2020 and lifted 15% in 2021 so a nice turn around although not quite up to the record 2019 year. The Urus SUV accounts for two thirds of production. The flagship sports car the Aventador is down to under 8%. 

Regional deliveries are put under Audi's figures by the VW Group. Lamborghini independently reported 3,250 sales in EMEA (Europe, Middle East, Africa), 2,915 in the Americas and 2,240 in the Asia/Pacific region. 

Data source: VW Group.

VW LCV Global Model Production : 2020-21

Probably an area of the market that flies under the radar as private buyers are obviously not generally considering purchasing them. However, an important part of VW's operations. The Transporter T6 is the mainstay of the LCV division. VW moved the Saveiro light pickup over to passenger cars a few years back but I have kept it here.

Data source: VW Group.

Regional deliveries: Europe is the main region for LCVs. My stubborness in keeping the Saviero in the category saves it from being even more one sided. I would have expected this division to be less reliant on Europe. 

Ecuador Sales : 2021

I don't usually do data for here as it isn't quite as many brands are not revealed but they only represent 1.6% of the total. Sales were up 39%. The +/- Diff column in the chart below shows which brands increased or decreased their share, so many that had increases in sales will show a negative result below. 

Chevrolet is comfortably in charge, with Kia taking a knock in market share. Chery arrested a gradual slide in a decisive manner. Chinese generally brands did well.

Data source: Aeade.

Bentley Model Production : 2020-21

Bentley had a cracking year with production volume up 38%. The Mulsanne may have retired but demand produced a record year. That helped profit along as well. The Bentayga took 40% of the total, the Continental a third and the Flying Spur just over a quarter. 

Data source: VW group.

Regional deliveries: There is a fairly even spread of deliveries across Asia/Pacific, Europe and North America. They all enjoyed healthy increases too.  

Audi Plant Production : 2019-21

If asked where are Audi cars made, how would respond? Germany obviously. The UK as they sell so many there, especially around the London Home Counties. Wrong. The USA? Wrong again. We can pass on the guessing as the data is below.

Nearly 40% are made in China, in five facilities no less. In fact, Changchun is the most prolific plant within the company. Next is Germany with 29%, in three plants and Ingolstadt is the largest as well as the headquarters of Audi. 

After that, it's individual plants in seven other countries. Brazil closed in 2020 and with the size of the output, better to import built up cars. India remains despite its limited size but I believe more assembly rather than production.   

Data source: Audi.

Škoda Global Model Production : 2020-21

Production was down 24% in 2020 and a further 15% in 2021. Profit was up so that's something to smile about. The Scala model passed the Octavia which has now had two years of substantial falls. A new model last year and another this year has expanded the range nicely. 

Data source: VW Group.

Regional deliveries: Europe is the epicentre of Škoda's sales and just got more so. China had a major reduction in units delivered and that impacted on overall volumes. 

Porsche Global Model Production : 2021-22

After a small 4% drop in production in 2020 to a +8%  a year later is a good result. I can't help but feel that the profitability of the marque helped in getting some extra semiconductor chips. The famed sports car brand relies heavily on SUVs although the 911 sports cars did have a good year.

Data source: VW Group.

Regional deliveries: Typical of the VW Group as a whole, Asia is such an important part of the sales success. Again deliveries exceeded production and passed the 300,000 mark. Stock levels must be getting very low. 

Audi Brands Global Model Production : 2020-21

 Production was down 8% in 2020 and 5% in 2021. Not large numbers but with profit up in 2021, hard to argue that it's a poor situation to be in. Both leading models are SUVs and any manufacturer who decides to ditch that category of vehicle would be foolhardy. The traditional passenger car/wagon is struggling.

Data source: VW group.

Regional deliveries: This includes Lamborghini. They are some way higher than the production numbers so is it a case of reduced inventories? Audi even managed to increase sales by 2%. Asia/Pacific was the only region up in 2020 but the only one down in 2021. 

VW Group Brands Sales vs Profit : 2020-21

I've already posted a couple of articles on VW Group. Production is down but how is the bottom line? Has it impacted profit? Let's see. Gowing from the largest in terms of volume down. Sales and Mill € both need three zeros added.

VW Car: Sales may have dropped 116,000 units but profit grew from €160 per car to €921. There could be various reasons for this like reduced inventory or pulling back on less profitable sales as two examples. Whatever the reasons, quite an upturn.

Audi: Sales were about the same but profit went up from €2,700 to €5,500 per car sold. The 2020 profit was the lowest since 2010 so a rebound could be expected but doubling it was a fine result.  

Škoda: Sales were down 65,000 but unit profit was up from €890 to €1,381. 

SEAT / Cupra: Sales were up by 10,000 and the loss was reduced from -€700 to -€472. I assume the reason for the losses that this division runs up is that 500,000 sales simply isn't quite enough.  

VW LCV: The light commercial division went from a -€1,316 loss to a + €224 per unit. LCVs are usually profitable so 2020 was a hiccup.

Porsche: Profit is a consistent result for the marque. Profit per vehicle went from €4,000 to €5,000 which was high even for this division. 

Bentley: It's usually in the black to a modest degree but has had some poor years. In 2010 for example, it lost over €50,000 for each car delivered and in 2018 -€30,000. Ouch. However, 2021 was a stellar year for the marque with profit just over €26,000 per car. The total profit wasn't that large due to only 14,800 sales but still a good result. 

Summary: Profit doesn't always come with volume as sales dropped and the black ink followed. It will be interesting to see how 2022 goes as the industry is going through challenging times. Thanks to the VW group for its transparency. 

SEAT/Cupra Brands Global Model Production : 2020-21

SEAT has been a problem for some time for VW. Making it a profitable operation is the task at hand and the lack of sufficient volume seems to be a major hurdle. Recently, the Cupra brand was created as a performance wing to presumably lift the company's sporty image as well as improve margins.  

Cupra: After a few models were sold under the SEAT brand, the marque was spun off as a stand alone entity. VW did this in 2020 and it is now recognised as such in most markets. The 34,000 produced in 2020 jumped to 82,000 in 2021. A new model was born but the impetus mainly came from the Formentor.

SEAT: After a 37% drop in production in 2002, a much better -8% was the outcome in 2021 (when Cupra is included, there was a 4% increase). No one model managed to crack the six digit barrier which is surely not ideal. 

SEAT / Cupra deliveries by region: As to why the difference between production (above) and sales (below) was nearly 50,000 units I am at a loss to explain. The brand lacks anything like a global reach with 95% of sales in Europe and a few in 'Other'. 

The North American figure is just Mexico. The small Asia Pacific figure probably only includes NZ and Singapore. With the Addition of Australia during the year 2022, that should start to look more respectable. In NZ SEAT doesn't seem to be working but Cupra is doing much better. 

VW Brand Global Model Production : 2020-21

 It's nice to see VW open with its data, a policy it has retained for many, many decades. Even more so as volume contracts. As will be revealed in another post, profit is improving at the same time. 

Below are production figures, down 19% in 2021 and minus 8% in 2022. Even a quick glance shows that much of the reduction is with medium to large cars, often those for the Chinese market. I always thought VW relied too much on one country.

Data source: VW Group.

Regional deliveries: Notice this data is different from the above as that is production. The fewer deliveries in the Asia / Pacific region account for the total reduction. It still takes over half the deliveries but is less than a year ago. The current percentage (52.6) is the lowest since 2015. 

Summary: VW had a goal of being the biggest producer of vehicles in the world but that seems to have been abandoned. Instead, improved profit is the focus, which is better than being distracted by units made.