Introduction to Kazakhstani Passenger Car Market Report Contains All You Will Ever...

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Wed Aug 27, 2008 11:19pm EDT

Introduction to Kazakhstani Passenger Car Market Report Contains All You Will Ever Need To Know On This Fascinating Subject

DUBLIN, Ireland--(Business Wire)--
Research and Markets
(http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/d3254f/introduction_to_ka)
has announced the addition of the "Introduction to Kazakhstani
Passenger Car Market" report to their offering.

   With 15.5 million inhabitants, Kazakhstan is the fourth largest
country in CIS, after Russia, Ukraine and Uzbekistan. Given the
difficult political situation in Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan is actually
the third most interesting country in CIS. Kazakhstan's real GDP was
growing with double-digits over the last years. Wages were also
growing at a comparable pace and are now at 424 USD per month on
average. With rising inflation, real growth will be more moderate in
the future.

   Kazakhstan's car penetration is comparable with Russia and still
much lower than in Western European markets. The growth in car park
was mainly driven by imports of used cars, which peaked in 2006. The
new car market is also growing continuously but growth rates of 40%
p.a. over the last years cannot be maintained in the future. We
estimate a growth of about 19% p.a. until 2010.

   The new car market is characterized through the large number of
grey dealers. Whereas in 2006 more than 50% of new car sales of
non-CIS brands were made through grey dealers, this share in reducing
now. Russian brands still play a strong role in the market and grow
with overall market development. The park is still dominated by VAZ.

   Financing of cars is developing rapidly while market penetration
is still low. Financing is especially important for Kazakhstan since
consumers prefer large cars and SUVs which are more costly. The
availability of personal information for loan procedures is improving,
but only slowly. With rising inflation, however, the growth of car
financing might be limited.

   Kazakhstan currently is not a market for small cars. Most cars
sold are from lower and upper medium class or SUV-class. The
availability of smaller cars is also limited, for example Toyota is
not selling its Yaris through its official dealerships. It is unclear,
how consumers will react to a better offering of smaller, affordable
cars. With energy prices up and inflation on the rise, smaller, less
fuel consuming cars could be an opportunity in the market.

   Kazakhstan has no own passenger car brand. Azia Avto, a company
listed on the Kazakhstan Stock Exchange (KASE), currently is the only
producer, assembling Ladas, Skodas and Chevrolets. Nissan is about to
set up an assembling facility and several Korean and Chinese OEMs are
investigating a potential entry. With plans of AvtoVAZ, the Russian
car maker, to buy a stake of at least 25% in Azia Avto, the situation
is getting more complicated. Since Renault took a stake of 25% plus
one share in AvtoVAZ, and Renault and Nissan being part of the same
group, the car manufacturing scene in Kazakhstan might look different.

   Given this situation, there is a limited number of players in the
automotive industry in Kazakhstan. Most of them export, mainly to
Russia. The government wants to develop the automotive industry and is
slowly progressing. Nissan's plant and Nokian Tyres' production joint
venture are first steps. Kazakhstan's advantages are, besides
incentives provided by the government, its strategic location to
Russia, the upcoming Eurasian Economic Community (EurAsEC) which will
develop a customs union between Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus at
first and the low wages. In total, we expect a strong increase in
local production activities although still on a low level compared to
major automotive nations.

   Key Topics Covered:

   1 TABLE OF CONTENTS 2

   2 LIST OF FIGURES 4

   3 LIST OF TABLES 6

   4 SUMMARY 7

   COUNTRY BASICS 10

   5 KAZAKHSTANI PASSENGER CAR MARKET 19

   6 KAZAKHSTANI COMPONENTS AND SPARE PARTS MARKET 43

   7 OPPORTUNITIES AND RISKS 59

   8 APPENDICES 61

   9 ABBREVIATIONS 65

   List of Figures

   List of Tables

   For more information visit
http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/d3254f/introduction_to_ka.

Research and Markets
Laura Wood
Senior Manager
press@researchandmarkets.com
Fax from USA: 646-607-1907
Fax from rest of the world: +353-1-481-1716

Copyright Business Wire 2008
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