MANILA: Local vehicle assemblers increased their sales in July 2024 by 6.1 percent to 39,331 units from 37,096 units in the same month in 2023, the joint report of the Chamber of Automotive Manufacturers of the Philippines, Inc. (CAMPI) and Truck Manufacturers Association (TMA) said Thursday. Both passenger car and commercial vehicle segments rose last month, with growth mostly driven by the former. Passenger cars sold 10,923 units in July 2024, 14.9 percent higher than the sales a year ago at 9,509 units. Commercial vehicle sales for the same comparable period stood at 28,408 units this year from 27,577 units in the previous year. Month-on-month, sales growth was below 1 percent, or at 0.6 percent, from June 2024's 39,088 unit sales. 'New product launches, improved product offerings, good sales momentum, as well as supply availability helped neutralize the impact of Typhoon Carina, especially towards the latter part of July,' CAMPI president Rommel Gutierrez said in a statement. For the first seven mon ths of the year, combined CAMPI and TMA sales grew faster at 10.9 percent, selling 265,610 units from 239,501 units in January to July 2023. Passenger car segment shared 27 percent of the pie, with 70,798 unit sales in January to July 2024, increasing by 17.3 percent from 60,357 units in the same period last year. On the other hand, commercial vehicle sales for the same period grew 8.7 percent to 194,812 units, or accounting for 73 percent of the total vehicle sales. Sales of this segment improved by 8.7 percent from 179,144 units in the first seven months in 2023. Top brand names for this period are Toyota, Mitsubishi, Ford, Nissan, and Suzuki. Source : Philippines News agency