How Renault beat the slow down in September and gained market share

Renault India volumes saw a sharp 30% jump in Sep '19 compared to the same month last year which boosted its market share by more than 50% from 2.2% in Sep '18 to 3.7% in Sep '19.

Renault was the only manufacturer to not just beat the slowdown but post significant increase in sales whereas rest all saw massive declines in volumes.

Source - http://www.autopunditz.com/

So what exactly did Renault do to put up such a show?

Innovate or offer fresh models regularly (less than 6 months)

Let's deep dive into Renault sales numbers to identify the root cause of this turnaround. In the table below we see all existing model red except the Lodgy and newly launched Triber. Now we can ignore Lodgy as it has insignificant impact on the overall volumes.

Triber was launched just few months back, clocked 4,710 units already in Sep '19. Triber marks Renault's entry into the MUV/MPV segment. Not only the Triber is a fresh face, it also helped Renault break into a new segment.

Renault has also launched the facelift of Kwid at end of Sep '19 and would be interesting to see if it is able to boost Renault's sales further. We'll need to wait for Oct' 19 sales numbers to check this.

Let's look into the top manufacturers on how did they fare in Sep '19 -

Hyundai - Santro, Venue to the rescue

For Hyundai sales dipped 15%, but it could have been worse without the new launches - Santro and Venue. Remove these two models and Hyundai would have been looking at around 40% dip into sales volume for Sep '19.

All major existing models - i10, i20, Xcent and Creta - saw major decline in consumer interest. Clearly, none of these models had any exciting facelifts or new gen launches in the last 6 months.

i10 Grand Nios (facelift launched in Aug '19) also didn't make much of an impact on the already high volumes. Might be safe to say that it may have arrested further decline.

i20 had its last facelift 9 months back in Jan '19. Same can be said for other high volume models of Hyundai - Creta and Xcent.

Maruti Suzuki - Majority volumes from outdated models, bound to shed volumes

Maruti Suzuki dropped 27% in volumes - no surprise here - all of its existing major models have not seen any new facelift or new gen launch in the last 6 months

Swift, Baleno, Ciaz, Dzire all took heavy beating this year in September. And what's the common theme between them? None of them have had any facelifts or new gen launches.

On the other hand, S-Presso and XL6 - the new models - are raking in pretty good numbers.

Does that mean this slowdown in the auto industry is not entirely because of the sluggish economy but primarily driven by the lack of fresh and exciting offerings by the auto companies?

Would be great to know what you all think of about this. Do post your thoughts as comments below.