SEAT to Launch Sales, Service Network in China

MADRID – SEAT, the Spanish auto maker owned by Volkswagen, is launching a sales and service network in China.

SEAT CEO James Muir tells journalists at the Guangzhou auto show this week the auto maker has signed distribution agreements with 12 dealers and hopes at least three more will agree to join the network in the coming weeks.

Muir says so far 12 Chinese dealers have distribution rights.

SEAT officials said at the Shanghai auto show held earlier this year that the Spanish auto maker was seeking a presence in the major cities of Beijing, Chongqing, Shenzhen, Wuhan, Chengdu and Guangzhou.

The first SEAT vehicles will be shipped to China by boat in December, but the auto maker will wait until April to begin sales, corresponding with the opening of the Beijing auto show.

China, Russia and Mexico are the key markets for the survival of SEAT.

“SEAT hopes to be one of the main foreign importers in China, a market that, together with Russia and Mexico, will contribute to increasing our exportations and sales during the next years,” Paul Sewin, vice president-sales, says in Guangzhou.

SEAT says it has suffered financial losses due to the contraction of Europe’s car market over the past two years.

But the auto maker already was in the red before the global economic crisis, with profits down in five of the last six years.

Muir, who took the helm at SEAT two years ago with the purpose of quickly putting the company in order, has seen his goal defeated by Spain’s weakening economy and poor industrial environment.

Dealing with these problems has consumed two of the five years Volkswagen conceded to SEAT to restore profits.