Luxury car maker BMW starts to feel industry pain

Chief executive Norbert Reithofer said conditions were weakening, after the German company posted a 14% rise in third-quarter profit on Tuesday that beat analysts’ forecasts.“Like the rest of the sector, we are now beginning to feel some headwind,” Norbert Reithofer said in a statement, which BMW put down to “intense competition”—an industry term for rising levels of incentives to attract customers such as low interest-rate financing and cheap leasing deals.Engineeeing Colleges Tamil NaduFor example, BMW offers leasing conditions on its revamped 3 Series that effectively equate to 26% off the list price in Germany, according to the CAR think tank at the University Duisburg-Essen.Best Engineering CollegesWith factories running flat out to meet surging demand in China and the US, German premium car makers were considered largely invulnerable to the crisis buffeting mass-market European car makers. But cracks are beginning to show.Daimler’s Mercedes luxury car business last month warned it would fall nearly €800 million short of its earnings target this year and delayed plans to reach a 10% operating profit margin by 2013.Read More: livemint.com