GM's sales in China, in which Cadillac is critical, are up 11.6%, but still trail Volkswagen's results.
The automotive sales race in China is a neck-and-neck affair, but the Volkswagen Group continues to hold a lead of about 140,000 units over rival General Motors. Other makers that were expecting to see strong results there – namely Ford and Nissan – have fallen off the pace a bit in recent months.
Volkswagen reported its sales have increased 15% to 2.72 million units through Sept. 30, making China the company’s single largest global market. Sales were strong during September when the German maker delivered 2.72 million units in China, marking a 15.2% increase.
GM and its Chinese joint ventures reported a 15.2% increase in September as well. For the first nine months, GM’s sales totaled 2.58 million vehicles, up 11.6% from the same period a year earlier.
GM executives told investors earlier this month it plans to invest $12 billion in China between 2014 and 2017 and build five more plants to ramp up its manufacturing capacity.
Ford is also racing to expand its capacity in China and reported that sales dropped slightly in September as it waits for its new assembly facilities come online and new vehicles hit showrooms in the next several months.
Ford and its Chinese joint ventures sold 95,875 vehicles in China in September, down 0.2% from the same period a year earlier, the company said. The downturn marked the first down month in 2014 for the automaker. It posted double-digit increases in every month prior to September. Overall, Ford sales are up 9% year-over-year.
Nissan Motor Co, one of Japan’s leading carmakers in China, reported that along with its Chinese joint venture partner, it sold about 93,700 automobiles in September, down 20% from a year earlier. The September follows a 0.7% year-on-year decrease in August and a 12.3% drop in July.
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The company said in a statement the decline in September was due to sluggish sales of light commercial vehicles and increased competition in the passenger car segment.
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Nissan, which operates a car venture in China with Dongfeng Motor Group Co Ltd., has said it expects to sell 1.4 million cars in the country this year, up 10.6% from a year earlier.
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Nissan executives have said that the company aims to achieve annual China sales of 2 million cars by 2017-2018 as it bolsters its business in what is now the world’s largest car market.
During the past couple of years, Japanese carmakers have run into difficulties created by fallout from diplomatic disagreements between the Chinese and Japanese governments over contested islands in the East China Sea as well as long-standing disputes over the conduct of Japanese troops stationed in China during World War II.