Fiat Ducato makes its mark

Fiat's new Ducato may not be the biggest-selling commercial van in Australia, but sales proceeded very nicely for the Italian importer in 2007, with the total figure for the year of 768 vehicles making it by far the biggest contributor to the company's local commercial lineup.

In all, Fiat sold 971 commercial vehicles during 2007, representing a 26 per cent increase over 2006.

And the company says this will only get better in 2008, with several new models due to arrive here during the year.

These include the new Scudo medium-size van later in the third quarter and the Fiorino bonneted van at the tail end of 2008.

These new vehicles will be preceded by the addition of an automated manual MTA transmission for the Ducato which, according to Fiat, combines the ease of driving of a conventional automatic with the fuel economy and performance of a manual.

According to Fiat Commercial Vehicles Australian general manager Chris Swann, "Not only have the excellent qualities of the vehicle proven extremely attractive to our key business users and motor home builders, the increased size range and conversion flexibility has enabled converters to expand their Fiat Ducato-based ranges."

With all this, Mr. Swann said he expects 2008 Fiat commercial vehicle sales to almost double those of 2007.

Fiat's local passenger car division is performing steadily with the Punto model, although it far from matched its stated 2007 sales target of 1400 vehicles by selling just 739 during the new light car's first full year on the Australian market.

This compared with 335 Puntos sold in the five months it was sold here after its launch in July 2006.

In the commercial van segment, Toyota maintains its lead as the biggest seller in Australia with 7,672 Hiace vans sold during 2007 – a drop of 9.4 per cent from 2006 – while Mitsubishi gained  a massive 46.1 per cent to sell 3,387 Express vans and claim second spot. In third position, Ford also increased sales of its Transit in 2007, selling 2,046 vehicles to record a 6.6 per cent improvement over 2006.

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