The global chip shortage has begun to affect luxury car maker Mercedes Benz in India.
Martin Schwenk, MD and CEO of Mercedes Benz India, told BusinessLine , that almost every model is affected and customers are seeing wait times of 8-12 weeks. "These lead times can even go higher, depending on the type of model,” he said.
Despite supply chain issues, post-Covid recovery for the company has had a strong V-shaped trajectory. Mercedes-Benz recorded one of the highest ever sales numbers in the third quarter of 2021. With sale of 4,101 units, the company saw 99 per cent growth in comparison to last year which Schwenk said was a result of low-base effect.
However, in comparison to 2019 third-quarter sales of 3,354 units, there was an uptick of 22 per cent.
Schwenk attributed strong recovery in the aftermath of the second wave to greater economic certainty.
“Our customers are primarily businessmen, who had greater confidence in the present state of economic growth, leading to these purchases. The recovery is much better than we anticipated during April,” he said.
New launch
Mercedes Benz is also set to launch its new ‘Retail of the Future Model’ which was introduced as a concept in June. Set to launch on October 22, Mercedes Benz has completed all the necessary steps for transition to the new retail concept which allows the automaker to sell directly to consumers.
Mercedes locally produces 13 models and 95 per cent of the volumes that are sold in India. This includes S-Class. On Thursday, Mercedes announced that it has also launched production lines in it Chakhan factory, in Pune for the new S-Class variant 350 d and 450 MATIC.