Maruti Suzuki produced 51,000 fewer cars in June quarter

India's largest carmaker Maruti Suzuki India Ltd. on Wednesday said it produced 51,000 fewer vehicles in the first quarter due to the ongoing chip shortage.

Owing to the semiconductor crisis, pending customer orders stood at about 280,000 vehicles at the end of the June quarter, the automaker says, adding it is making efforts to serve these orders fast.

Maruti Suzuki says its operating profit in the quarter ended June was adversely impacted by the increase in prices of commodities due to the Russia-Ukraine war, forcing the carmaker to hike prices of vehicles to partially offset this impact.

Net profit of the country's biggest car manufacturer zoomed 130% year-on-year to ₹1,012.80 crore in the April-June quarter compared with ₹440.80 crore in the corresponding period last year.

Maruti Suzuki clocked net sales of ₹25,286.3 crore in the April-June period, an increase of 50.52% compared to the year-ago quarter.

EBIT margin for the quarter rose to 5%, an improvement of 450 basis points over 0.5% in the year-ago quarter.

To be sure, performance in Q1 FY22 was severely affected by the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic as retailers shuttered showrooms due to lockdowns.

The carmaker sold a total of 467,931 vehicles during the quarter. Sales in the domestic market stood at 398,494 units. Exports were at 69,437 units, the highest ever in any quarter. During the same period previous year, the company sold 353,614 units, including sales of 308,095 units in the domestic market and 45,519 units in export markets.

Maruti Suzuki's operating profit stood at ₹1,260.7 crore during the first quarter of the ongoing financial year compared with ₹77.9 crore in the corresponding period last year.

The profit before tax was also impacted by the non-operating income being lower in this quarter due to mark-to-market loss. The company says it continued to work on cost reduction efforts to minimise the impact on customers.

On a sequential basis, the company's profit declined 45% to ₹1,012.80 crore in Q1 compared with ₹1,838.9 crore in the previous quarter. Revenue fell 0.9% while sales volume dipped 4.3% on a quarter-on-quarter basis. Material costs and employee costs soared by 120 basis points and 60 bps sequentially.