Passenger cars drove up sales by 19.3% in Jan.

MANILA, Philippines—The Philippine automotive industry opened the year on a positive note as vehicle sales grew by 19.3 percent to 18,662 units in January, driven largely by the strong performance of the passenger car segment.

Based on the joint report filed by the Chamber of Automotive Manufacturers of the Philippines Inc. (Campi) and the Truck Manufacturers Association (TMA), member firms posted a 35.8-percent hike in passenger car sales to 7,200 units in January this year, from the 5,301 units sold in the same month of 2014. Sales of commercial vehicles similarly rose 10.8 percent to 11,462 units for the same period.

According to Campi president Rommel Gutierrez, the groups’ performance last month was, so far, the highest level of sales achieved for a January month.

As of end-January 2015, Toyota Motor Philippines Corp. continued to lead the industry with an improved market share of 46.7 percent, equivalent to sales of 8,709 units, followed by Mitsubishi Motors Philippines Corp. with 17.4 percent (3,243 units). Ford Motor Co. Phils. Inc. meanwhile took the third spot with a market share of 8.8 percent (1,637 units), followed by Isuzu Philippines Corp.at 6.57 percent (1,227 units). Rounding up the top five was Honda Cars Philippines Inc. with a 6.13-percent share, equivalent to 1,144 units.

Gutierrez pointed out that the sales performance of Campi and TMA in January was an “early sign that our targets are achievable,” with more new product launches and promotion packages expected throughout the year.

Campi projected at least a 15-percent growth in vehicle sales for 2015 to about 272,000 units, from the 234,747 units sold in 2014.

Of the target volume, passenger cars and commercial vehicles will take up 40 percent and 60 percent respectively.

Gutierrez earlier expressed confidence that total industry demand for this year could easily exceed 300,000 units. This “fearless forecast” was reportedly well within the market growth projection of the industry.

But the Campi chief emphasized that the Philippine vehicle assembly sector continued to face challenges, specifically in increasing its share of the growing local automotive market or at least maintaining it as the government has yet to issue the much awaited industry roadmap.

The roadmap is expected to contain time-bound and performance-based incentives not only for manufacturers who can invest in their assembly lines to increase their production volumes for export, but also for those that will invest in new facilities for large components manufacturing. Fiscal and non-fiscal incentives under this program will be granted under certain performance conditions.

Within this roadmap is the so-called Comprehensive Automotive Resurgence Strategy program, which will entail an appropriation of a $600 million incentive package for the automotive industry.