The accounts still hold but for how long? Deliveries of Mercedes-Benz grew by 3% in the first nine months of the year to over 1.67 million units, reports the German company from Stuttgart which is part of the Daimler group. Growth was helped by strong demand in Asia and China, but the impact of the semiconductor shortage increased in the third quarter, particularly in September, reports the German auto maker. Mercedes-Benz is making every effort to ensure deliveries to customers, the situation for the chip supply remains volatile and the shortage will continue to impact in the coming quarters – a statement reads – in terms of both production and sales.
The semiconductor crisis, however, is not the only problem. The delays on deliveries of raw materials and components, the exorbitant cost of freight rates and containers, and now also the energy crisis that is stopping factories in China, with drops of between 10 and 30%, can only make everything more hard. Orders for the Automotive sector fell a lot in August, including for the German industry: -12% on the previous month.
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In fact, Daimler’s results, excellent up to the mid-year halfway point with + 24% of cars sold and operating profit of 11 billion, were severely compromised in the third quarter, with worldwide deliveries of Mercedes-Benz down to 434,784 units. (-30.5%). The German group reports “solid global demand and a good acquisition of orders”, but above all the leap in electrified models, between plug-in hybrids and 100% electric – which collected 184,369 orders between January and September (+ 142.7% ).
“Mercedes-Benz is making every effort to ensure that customer orders can be fulfilled,” the note noted, adding that “the situation with the chip supply remains volatile and the shortage is expected to continue to affect the coming quarters in terms of production and sales “.
At the regional level since the beginning of 2021 the result in the Asia-Pacific area stands out with 788,713 deliveries (+ 5.6%), which absorbed a strong share of high-end models. The profitability of the group is supported by the excellent reception of the new generation of the S-Class flagship with global sales increased in the first nine months by 45% to 62,306 units. Sales of the AMG division also performed well (116,394 units delivered and + 30.6%), of the G-Class models (31,637 units and + 29.6%) and of the luxurious Mercedes-Maybach (10,809 units and + 41.8%).