Chrysler 2003 Annual Report Download - page 55

In China, Naveco, a 50-50 joint venture with the Yueijin Group,
produced and sold about 14,700 light vehicles (approximately
+1%) and the C.B.C. joint venture (busses) sold about 4,600 units.
In Turkey, the Otoyol licensee sold about 4,400 units (+6,9%)
and Ashok Leyland, Iveco’s Indian licensee, manufactured
and shipped 45,150 units (+38%).
In 2003, Iveco continued to expand its portfolio of maintenance
and repair services. It had a total of about 40,000 contracts in force
at the end of 2003, or 2.5% more than at December 31, 2002.
Financial and service activities
In 2003, the finance companies of the Iveco Finance Group,
which provide financing and leasing services to support the
sales of Iveco products in Western Europe, signed 22,533
contracts to finance sales of new commercial vehicles (34,000
in 2002) and 7,587 contracts for used commercial vehicles,
busses, trailers and semitrailers, for a total of 30,120 new
transactions. Iveco Finance provided funding for 22% of the
vehicles sold by the Sector (29.4% in 2002). A total of 103,345
financing contracts were outstanding at the end of 2003
(105,700 at December 31, 2002) with a total net value of 2,312
million euros (about 2,600 million euros at the end of 2002).
The pool of rental vehicles operated by the Transolver Services
companies numbered about 4,600 units at the end of 2003,
with 1,530 new contracts signed during the year. The decrease
in business volume and the contraction of the vehicle pool with
respect to the previous year (equal to about 37,000 units) reflect
changes in the Sector’s scope of consolidation following the
sale of Fraikin at the beginning of the year.
The Sector’s operations that provide rental and financing
services to retail customers generated aggregate net revenues
of 655 million euros in 2003 (1,005 million euros in 2002, when
Fraikin was included). Restated on a comparable basis, net
revenues show a year-over-year gain of 180 million euros
(+37.8%), 154 million euros of which are attributable to the
consolidation for the full year of net revenues generated by
Iveco International Trade & Finance, a company that offers sales
financing to customers in Eastern Europe and the Middle East.
Operating income fell to about 7 million euros (18 million
euros in 2002 on a comparable basis). The main reason for this
decrease is a shortfall in revenues. This shortfall had a negative
impact on the operating performance of the Transolver Finance
and Iveco Service companies, which, as stated above, signed
fewer new contracts than in 2002.
The loss before taxes of normal operations amounted to
about 43 million euros (loss of 183 million euros in 2002). On
a comparable consolidation basis and excluding the impact
of the loss incurred in connection with the Fraikin disposal
(210 million euros), these operations would have been
profitable by 3 million euros. The result for 2003 was affected
by an increase in non-operating charges, chief among
them the remaining loss on the disposal of Fraikin.
54 Report on Operations Iveco
Sales Performance –Units Sold by Country
(in thousands of units) 2003 2002 % change
France 17.8 17.6 1.1
Germany 14.0 15.0 (6.7)
Great Britain 13.8 16.2 (14.9)
Italy 38.3 44.3 (13.6)
Spain 14.8 14.7 0.8
Western Europe 119.3 128.8 (7.4)
Eastern Europe 9.7 9.5 1.6
Rest of the world (*) 17.5 23.6 (26.0)
Total units sold (**) 146.4 161.9 (9.6)
Associated companies 49.6 37.5 32.1
Grand total 196.0 199.4 (1.7)
(*) Naveco (50-50 joint venture) consolidated proportionally in 2002 and by the equity
method in 2003.
(**) On a comparable consolidation basis the change is -6.8%.