Thaindian News

Chennai, July 21 (IANS) With luxury car market logging good growth and its purchases mainly driven by financing options, Mercedes Benz India is planning to have its own finance arm.
“We will be soon launching our global vehicle financing arm Daimler Financial Servicing in India,” Debashis Mitra, director (sales and marketing), told reporters here Wednesday, launching the company’s pre-owned car business ‘Proven Exclusivity’.

With its own financing arm and several new models, Mercedes Benz is planning to take advantage of the luxury car market logging around 50 percent growth.

The Daimler group is also putting up a truck plant near here and a financing arm now is ideal time to float.

However, Mitra declined to comment on the time frame for launching the group’s finance arm.

According to him, the company sold around 2,450 cars between January and June 2010 as compared to around 1,400 units for the corresponding period of the previous year.

Last year the company sold around 3,250 cars utilising around 60 percent of its production capacity. With demand shooting up, Mercedes Benz is planning to start second shift.

During the past seven months the company launched 16 models and more is on the anvil mainly in the sports utility vehicle (SUV) segment.

He said the pre-owned cars will be sold through authorised dealers and purchasers will be provided additional support in areas like financing, documentation and delivery, Mitra said.

Over the past 15 years the company has sold around 30,000 vehicles giving a good volume base for it to start the pre-owned car business.

He said the C-class cars will be available in the range of Rs.1.5 million and E-class around Rs.2.5 million.