FRANKFURT -- Volkswagen said vehicle sales for its brands, which include Audi, Porsche and Bentley, increased 7 percent in September as strong demand from China outweighed declining deliveries in core European markets.
Global sales rose to 856,900 last month from 801,200 the same month a year earlier, VW said in a statement today.
Audi sales increased by 10 percent to 150,300 while Porsche delivered 12,970 cars, up 9 percent.
VW brand sales were up 7 percent to 526,300, bouncing back from sales declines of 1 percent in both July and August. Deliveries at Seat rose 14 percent to 31,900.
Skoda boosted volume by 3 percent to 86,600 vehicles last month, with the launch of new models helping to halt a decline seen since the start of the year. "The success of this September shows that our model campaign is paying off," Werner Eichhorn, Skoda's board member for sales and marketing, said in a statement.
Skoda said last month that it had reached full production of the new version of its flagship Octavia compact in August and was also boosting production of other new models. In September, sales of the new Octavia rose by 26 percent in western Europe.
Record 9-month sales
VW's nine-month group sales topped 7 million vehicles for the first time. Deliveries rose 5 percent to 7.03 million units.
Sales in China through September rose 18 percent to 2.35 million, boosted by locally produced vehicles such as Audi's Q3 and Q5 SUVs. European deliveries fell by 2.4 percent to 2.73 million. U.S group sales increased by 7 percent to 463,200.
Porsche led nine-month sales growth among group brands, with a rise of 15 percent to 119,747, followed by Seat, whose deliveries rose 12 percent to 266,100.
Audi deliveries rose 8 percent to 1.18 million, while sales at VW brand rose 4 percent through September to 4.36 million.
In the first nine months, Skoda sold 684,900 cars, down 5 percent.
VW is aiming for record group sales this year of 9.5 million cars, up from 9.3 million in 2012, CEO Martin Winterkorn said last month at the Frankfurt auto show.
Reuters and Bloomberg contributed to this report
