BMW Group sales increase 15.9% for June: All-time high

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The BMW Group delivered more vehicles in June than ever before in a month. A total of 165.855 BMW, MINI and Rolls-Royce brand vehicles were sold, which is an increase of +15.9% on sales in June last year (prev. yr. 143,156 units) and also a new all-time high. The company also achieved a new high for the first six months: Group retail volume for the year to the end of June increased by more than 137.000 units to 833.366 vehicles, which represents a growth of 19.7% compared to the first half of 2010.

In June, the BMW brand delivered 134,432 (prev. yr. 119,663) vehicles to customers worldwide – an increase of 12.3%. Year-to-date, BMW brand sales rose 17.8% to 689,861 automobiles (prev. yr. 585,750).

MINI reported sales of 31,111 vehicles in June, a new record for the month and an increase of 34.1% over the 23,202 cars sold in June, 2010. Year-to-date, MINI sales are up 29.8% on volume with 141,913 compared to 109,302 in the first six months of 2010.

Rolls-Royce had a record first half of the year with 1,592 motor cars sold (prev. yr. 970 / +64.1%).

Ian Robertson, member of the Board of Management of BMW AG, responsible for Sales and Marketing: “We have just achieved another record month in sales and the best six months in our company’s history. These figures reflect the strong global demand for BMW, MINI and Rolls-Royce cars and Motorcycles. We aim to continue our balanced growth, in both mature and emerging markets. Due to the model cycle and the year-on-year base effect we do anticipate a somewhat slower rate of growth in the second half of the year.”

Double-digit growth across all continents contributed to the Group’s record first half in 2011: Sales rose in Europe (437,373 vehicles / +12.3%) and in the Americas (178,903 vehicles / +18.7%) as well as in Asia (189,254 vehicles / +47.3%).

In the first half of 2011, the Group had more vehicle registrations in its home market of Germany (149,786, +10.6 over prev. yr.), than in any other country. The US reported the sale of 143,521 vehicles in the same period, which represents a growth of 18% over the first half of 2010. China continues to see strong double digit growth and the company reported the sale of 121.614 vehicles year-to-date, which is a growth of 61 percent over 2010. The Group also saw impressive growth in the dynamic young markets of Brazil (+69%) Russia (+31.6%), India (+107.2%), Korea (+71.9%) and Turkey (+179.6%) in the first six months of 2011.

BMW brand: X3 more than doubles sales in the first half of 2011
The BMW X3 continued its strong sales success in June with 10,743 units (prev. yr. 4,651 / +131%). Year-to-date, the new BMW X3 has sold 53,522 compared with 24,836 in the same period of 2010, an increase of 115.5%. With a total of over 250,000 units sold since its introduction in March last year, the new BMW 5 Series Sedan continues to be a highly successful model and is global market leader in the premium upper mid-size segment. In June, 28,014 BMW 5 Series were purchased (prev. yr. 19,470 / +43.9%) and 158,562 year-to-date which is 91.3% percent more than the previous year (82,905). The new BMW 6 Series got off to a good start since its launch in March and has already been delivered to around 2,500 customers. The BMW 7 Series had its strongest first six months ever with 31,764 cars sold (+3.4%).

MINI brand: Record first six months
The January to June numbers of 141,913 are the highest achieved since MINI’s relaunch in 2001. More than 40,000 customers bought the new MINI Countryman in the first half of 2011. In June, MINI announced that a new member will join the family in autumn 2011, the MINI Coupé.

Motorcycles: Highest first half-year figures in history
In June, a total of 11,831 (prev. yr. 11,584 / +2.1%) vehicles were delivered to customers. In the first half-year of 2011, BMW Motorrad sold 60,580 (prev. yr. 57,015) vehicles – more than ever in a first half-year. This represents a retail growth of 6.3 % from the first half of 2010. In a challenging environment in the market segment greater 500 cm3, BMW Motorrad was still able to reach an excellent sales result in the first half-year and remains consistently on a growth path. The demand for BMW motorcycles is very high across all models. The Boxer model range still registers the highest sales volume by far. With 1,255 units, sales of the K 1600 Super-Tourer with 6-cylinder engine which was introduced in Spring 2011 exceeded expectations. Husqvarna Motorcycles delivered 4,166 Motorcycles year-to-date (prev. yr. 5,387 / -22.7%), including 450 in June.