Mumbai: Fiat India Pvt Ltd has crossed the 4,000-mark in sales for June 2002, registering a whopping 605-per cent growth in sales as compared to the corresponding period of the previous year and a 14-per cent increase over the previous month. Sales for the month of June 2002 were 4,020 units as compared to 570 units in June 2001 and 3,525 units in May 2002. Of the 4,020 cars sold, the Palio accounted for 3,357 units the Siena 519 units, the Palio Adventure 64 units and Uno for the remaining 80 units.

The companys overall performance for the quarter April to June 2002 has been extremely encouraging, having registered a 20-per cent increase over the earlier quarter (January to March 2002). For the three months period April to June 2002, the companys sales soared to 11,748 units as compared to 9,764 units of the earlier three months.

Says Fiat India director (commercial) Vijay Chandorikar: "Encouraging top-line growth in the last few months has catapulted Fiat in the big league of the Indian auto industry, with our market share in the B segment alone moving up to an impressive 14 per cent. Besides the Palio, which is selling in large numbers, the new Siena and the Palio Adventure have also performed exceedingly well." "We have sold a total of 1,108 units of these two cars in a span of around 40 days, which is an excellent performance for C segment vehicles. For the new Siena we have over 800 orders in hand and the position for the Palio is equally strong with around 3,500 orders," he says.

The introduction of the Palio saw the monthly market share of Fiat increasing from 1.3 per cent in August 2001 to approximately 9 per cent in May 2002. Over the last nine months Fiat has sold about 28,000 Palios. "Encouraging customer response to its new models and increased production capabilities will enable the company to achieve its target of 50,000 cars this year," says Chandorikar.