Volkswagen Surpasses Ford for No. 3 Global Spot
July 30, 2008
The new world order of global auto giants is being shuffled. If first-half sales trends continue through the rest of the year, the new order of automakers, based on vehicle sales, will be: 1) Toyota, 2) General Motors, 3) Volkswagen and 4) Ford.
Volkswagen passed Ford to become the world's third-largest automaker for the first half of 2008, according to sales results from both companies. VW's global sales rose 7.2 percent to 3.31 million vehicles. Ford's sales fell 11 percent to 3.09 million cars and trucks; overseas sales increases were pulled down by declines in the U.S.
Toyota led GM at the half by about 278,000 units. GM stayed ahead of Toyota in 2007 by only about 3,000 vehicle sales.
Still, Toyota likely will delay its goal of being the first global automaker to sell more than 10 million vehicles worldwide. Toyota had intended to sell 10.4 million vehicles globally in 2009, but push that target to 2010, a Toyota executive told the Nikkei newspaper in Japan.
Earlier this week, Toyota trimmed its global sales forecast for 2008, due to the weak U.S. market.
Posted by Michelle Krebs at 6:49 AM under Analysis , Companies , Ford , GM , Toyota | Comments (0) | digg this | Seed Newsvine
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