2014/1/23 Corporate

PM industry to benefit from global car sales growth

According to research firm IHS Automotive, the global automotive industry is expected to continue to grow. The main driving force continues to be Asia, in particular record-breaking China. The forecast is encouraging news for the global PM industry which sells about 70% of all ferrous structural PM components to this sector.

The estimated global figure for 2014 is 85 million sold units which is a 4% increase compared to 2013. The increase will continue to reach over 100 million units by 2018, mainly as a result of the rising wealth in emerging markets.

In Europe, the market partially recovered in 2013 after six years of decline. According to a forecast issued by Deutsche Bank, about 14 million units will be sold on the European market in 2014 which corresponds to a 3% increase. Despite the negative sales figures in recent years, the industry has spent record amounts on research and development with focus on environmental technology.

In the US, the sales volume of light vehicles increased with 7.5% in 2013 and is expected to increase with another 3% in 2014. It is forecast that new plants in USA and Mexico will result in a 2.1 million unit increase of annual production in North America by 2020.

Asia is still the main driving force in automobile production with China as the largest market for all vehicle types. Both sales and production hit new records in China in 2013 and sales are expected to increase by 9-11% in 2014. Also Korea sold a record number of vehicles in 2013, a 5% increase on 2012, while Japan reported a modest increase of 0.1% and India its first fall (10%) in car sales in 11 years.

Source: http://www.ipmd.net/news/002561.html

新闻和媒体联系人

Emma Lefdal
VP Corporate Communications