!NEW! Opel Continues to Grow in Europe

• Sales increased by around 8,500 units in first three months of 2015
• Market share grew, market share gains in 11 European markets

Especially Opel Mokka SUV is a major momentum driver: Opel gains market share in 11 European countries

Opel is on the right track: with 279,306 new registrations in the first quarter of 2015, the automaker’s sales were considerably higher than the same year-ago period according to preliminary figures. The sales increase of around 8,500 cars is a plus of 3.1 percent. With this, Opel and its British sister brand Vauxhall grew slightly more than the overall European vehicle market‘s 2.8 percent increase. The automaker was also able to continue its positive market share trend from 2013 and 2014, slightly increasing it over the same year-ago period to 5.83 percent.

Peter Christian Küspert, Vice President Sales and Aftersales, Opel Group, was pleased with market share growth in a total of 11 European markets. “In countries like the UK, Spain, Italy, Poland and Turkey, demand is considerably higher than last year. With our young and attractive model portfolio, we benefit from this.”

The compact Opel Mokka SUV, which continues to be extremely popular and leads its segment in countries like Italy and Germany, is a major momentum driver. In the first quarter of 2015, the Rüsselsheim automaker surpassed the 50,000 mark for new passenger car registrations on its home market in Germany: exactly 51,584 (year-ago period: 49,965) new Opel cars hit the roads. The best month was March, when Opel increased its new registrations to 23,044 (March 2014: 22,131), a market share of 7.1 percent. The Opel passenger car market share in the first quarter of 2015 was 6.8 percent in Germany.

The light commercial vehicle (LCV) business showed a clear upwards trend. Opel improved market share in the European LCV field to 4.2 percent in the first quarter of 2015 – the best quarterly market share since 2009 thanks to the new Vivaro and Movano models. Peter Christian Küspert says, “The LCV business offers tremendous potential for growth and it is a key pillar of our long-term plan DRIVE! 2022.”