Amag wants to step on the gas with new models in the second half of the year
Published: Thursday, Jun 6th 2024, 14:31
Volver a Live Feed
After the dip at the beginning of the year, Amag wants to step on the gas again in the second half of the year when the new models arrive. The head of Switzerland's largest car importer, Helmut Ruhl, expects a decent result for the full year 2024, as he said in an interview with AWP Video on Thursday on the sidelines of the Swiss Economic Forum SEF in Interlaken.
"We actually lost some market share in the first quarter or in the first few months," admitted Ruhl: Amag's major product offensive is now starting with the Audi Q6, for example, or also with the VW ID.7. Then comes the electric Porsche Macan. The new Golf 8 with hybrid drive is also here.
There will therefore be product fireworks in the second half of the year, said Ruhl. "In this respect, we are optimistic for the second half of the year. We are assuming that we will have a good half-year in the second half," said the Amag CEO when asked whether the car importer would be able to make up for the shortfall of the first five months.
While the overall market for new cars remained at the previous year's level from January to May, sales of the Amag brands VW, Skoda, Audi and Seat/Cupra fell by more than 10 percent.
Ordinary result expected
When asked whether Amag would be able to break the CHF 5 billion turnover mark again for the year as a whole, Ruhl remained vague: "We don't focus so much on turnover as on the performance of our brands. And if we offer solutions that are in the interests of our customers, we will certainly also have a decent financial result." Last year, the company achieved a turnover of 5.2 billion Swiss francs.
The Swiss car market is unlikely to reach pre-corona levels this year either. "We are assuming that there will still be slight growth this year to around 260,000 new cars. But that would still be 15 percent less than the long-term average in Switzerland," said Ruhl: "And we assume that it will take another year or two before we see the level we saw before coronavirus, before the chip crisis and before all the changes."
©Keystone/SDA
Spanish 
English 
German 
French 
Arabic