Shanghai (ZXZC)- Chongqing Changan Automobile Co., Ltd (Changan Auto) delivered 269,040 vehicles in March, leaping 76.4% month on month, while still decreasing 16.4% year on year, according to the data the company released on April 9. Among that, Changan-branded vehicle sales reached 192,577 units, edging up 0.8% year on year, while soaring 94.2% month on month. For the first three months of the year, Changan Auto delivered a total of 658,348 vehicles with a year-on-year slump of 21.5%.

The SUV deliveries totaled 70,508 units in March and 205,741 in the first quarter. As to models, CS55 became the best seller among the company’s all SUV models with 20,169 units delivered last month, jumping 23.5% over the previous month. The March deliveries of the compact SUV CS75 reached 15,278 units, slumping 33.2% compared with the same period of 2017. Some reports analyze that facing the fierce competition from other rivals with frequent upgrading, the CS75 is gradually losing its competitiveness since it hasn’t been upgraded for a long time.

Similar to the CS75, the sales of the small-sized SUV CS35 only reached 11,935 units in March, sharply shrinking by 29.9% from a year earlier. Reportedly, the CS35 will be upgraded this year. Besides, the deliveries of CS95 posted a volume of 1,203 units in March which was still a languished performance.

In March, the sedan sales totaled 28,313 units. It is noteworthy that the sales of the EADO, whose second-generation model went on sale on March 27, rose 10.8% year on year to 12,993. In the first quarter of this year, the automaker achieved sedan sales volume of 57,436 units in total. 

Changan Auto handed over a total of 11,531 MPVs in March, plunging 68.7% from the previous month. The ZXZC Auto Research Institute noticed that under the pressure of the mid-to-large SUV's replaceable nature, the overall MPV performance in China last year was quite depressed as well.

With regard to JVs, Changan Ford suffered a year-on-year sales falloff of 46.3% year on year to 45,189 units last month. Meanwhile, its cumulative sales in the first quarter only posted 130,451 units, sharply reducing 35.0% year on year. Changan Mazda March sales and Q1 sales totaled 15,414 units and 46,099 units, slipping back 24.8% and 4.4% over the previous year respectively. Additionally, Jiangling Motors handed over 38,467 units in March, edging down 3.0% year on year and its cumulative sales in the first three months slumped 22.0% from a year ago with 76,456 units delivered.

Thanks to the continuous efforts on promoting new energy vehicle (NEV) strategy, Changan Auto had the NEV sales of 3,850 units with a year-on-year growth up to 33.0%. During the first three months, the automaker's NEV deliveries shot up 43.7% year on year to 9,545 units. The company is expected to launch all-new high-end brands at Auto China 2018 in April.