Isuzu East Africa sold its 43 pick-ups work Sh189 million to Avenue Car Hire Limited.
The sale signals surging demand that has benefitted vehicle assemblers, following the production of its 100,000 vehicles in July of this year.
According to Business Daily, this marks one of the significant purchases by a single customer in the new vehicle market.
“The first half has been strong because of backorders. The economy is recovering from the depths of last year,” Isuzu’s chief executive officer, said in a recent interview.
The company has attributed its achievement by its need to have a corporate immune system that has enabled it to scale and reach the present level in its operations.
The recent sale by Isuzu represents a 48 percent shot in sales of new motor vehicles, which in April registered a rebound from March.
This was on the back of a battered economy amid struggles to mitigate coronavirus effects since its advent in March last year.
Data from the Kenya Motor Industry Association (KMI) shows that formal dealers, including Toyota Kenya, Isuzu East Africa and DT Dobie moved 3,942 units in four months to April, compared to 2,661 units sold between January and March 2021.
Their orders rose 80 percent in the six months ended June.
The bulk of the assembled units are commercial vehicles –pick-ups, trucks and buses.
However, the dealers are adding more passenger car models to their assembly lines.
More production has been ramped up at the factory floors to meet demand as the economy emerges from a series of lockdowns that were imposed.
Through the ‘Build Kenya, Buy Kenya’ initiative, the government targets to reduce the level of motor parts importation in order to make it possible for local companies to buy from local manufacturers of vehicle parts as well as invent reduced tariffs for local car assemblers, lower high costs of additional taxes, charges, levies as well as logistical charges to grow the industry and make it competitive.
The Isuzu D-Max pick-ups are assembled locally and the car hire firm lease them to its customers in Nanyuki and other parts of the country.
