India July 2015: Maruti above 50% share, Hyundai Creta in Top 10

Maruti S-Cross. Every second passenger car sold in India this month is a Maruti.

* See the Top 15 best-selling brands and Top 60 models by clicking on the title *

The Indian new car market is up a very dynamic 13% year-on-year in July to 218.926 registrations, lifting the year-to-date total up 6% or 87.000 units to 1.540.293. It’s now done: for the first time since BSCB started following India monthly over 10 years ago, Maruti – the Indian subsidiary of Japanese carmaker Suzuki – has managed to lift its market share above the highly symbolic 50% mark thanks to sales up a whopping 23% on July 2014 to 110.405 or a 50.4% share. This is an extremely impressive achievement in one of the most dynamic car markets in the world where new launches occur on a weekly basis, even new brands such as the Datsun revival being inaugurated here (to no avail so far). Hyundai gains even more ground at +25% in 2nd place with 16.7% share, while Honda is up 19% to snap the YTD third spot off Mahindra. Toyota is back above Tata at #5 despite the latter gaining 14% in July, Volkswagen (+18%) and Datsun (+72% on a low base) improve whereas Ford (-43%), Renault (-44%), Nissan (-46%) and Chevrolet (-52%) continue to implode.

Over in the models ranking, we have a surprise on top: the Maruti DZire – a Swift sedan – manages to rank #1 for the 2nd consecutive month and the 5th time ever after May 2013, May 2014, July 2014 and June 2015 thanks to sales up 24% to 23.086 units, keeping the 2015 leader the Maruti Alto at bay at 22.212 deliveries (+31%). In fact the entire Top 10 best-selling models all outpace the market, showing a clear concentration of Indian customers’ choices. The Maruti Swift is up 20% at #3, the Wagon R up 32% at #4, the Hyundai Elite i20 is up 6-fold on the old model at #5 with the Hyundai Grand i10 (+24%), Maruti Celerio (+22%) and Omni (+17%) also shining.

The Jazz is already Honda’s best-seller in India (Japan model shown)

The big events of the month are found just below: dubbed “one of the most anticipated cars in recent history” in India, the Hyundai Creta aka ix25 doesn’t disappoint: up 313% on its opening score last month and 23 spots to crash into India’s 10 most popular vehicles at #9 with 6.783 deliveries to dealers  as India sales figures are wholesales. Although it doesn’t compete directly with it, the Creta absolutely kills the Ford Ecosport down 28% to 3.885 sales this month but most importantly the Renault Duster (-64%) and Nissan Terrano (-60%) are swept out of the picture with a paltry respective 1.005 and 645 sales.

After the Nano and the Bolt, the Zest is the latest in the list of Tata flops.

Another newcomer from last month, the Honda Jazz is up an equally impressive 15 spots and 186% on its June arrival figure to land at a beautiful 10th spot with 6.676 sales, instantly making it the brand’s best-seller above the City (5.180) and Amaze (4.589). We weldome the Maruti S-Cross in the Indian ranking at #31 with 1.510 sales this month. Thanks to the arrival of an automatic variant called GenX, the Tata Nano is slowing creeping up the ladder with a still slow 2.120 sales at #26 (+142%), that’s much better than the newer Tata Zest (1.458) and Bolt (433) now officially flops, while both the Datsun GO and GO+ remain outside the Top 40.

Previous post: India 1st Half 2015: Maruti, Hyundai and Honda impress

Previous month: India June 2015: Maruti DZire leads, Hyundai Creta lands

One year ago: India July 2014: Is the Datsun Go a flop?

Full July 2015 Top 15 brands and Top 60 models below.