Mercedes-Benz S-Class: the World's Best-selling Premium Automobile

Press Release

• S-Class Number One in the luxury segment every year since 1965
• Clear worldwide market leader
• Highest level of brand loyalty in the entire automobile industry
• Trendsetter for the auto industry: S-Class with pioneering innovations in automobile safety

Since its market launch in 1965, the S-Class has dominated the luxury segment. With more than 2.7 million sedans and coupes sold, the flagship of the Mercedes Benz brand has been the perennial market leader, and the S-Class currently holds a worldwide market share of more than 36 percent. "Despite increasingly intense competition, the S-Class is the world's best-selling luxury sedan," says Dr. Joachim Schmidt, Executive Vice President Sales and Marketing, Mercedes Car Group. This also applies to the most important foreign markets: "In the sixth year of its lifecycle, the S Class remains the Number One luxury automobile in Western Europe, the U.S. and Japan, outclassing its main competitors by a wide margin," Schmidt continues. This leading role is bolstered in particular by the market leadership of Mercedes-Benz when it comes to 12 cylinder engines.

With sales to date of approximately 2.6 million units, the S-Class sedan has been the top contributor to these positive results. Since the market launch of the current version in fall 1998, sales have risen to around 500,000 units. The coupes of the S-Class are also extremely popular with its clientele: Since the market launch more than 160,000 coupes have been sold to customers all over the world.

The S-Class enjoys a level of customer loyalty that is absolutely unrivaled throughout the triad markets in the automotive industry. It achieves the highest loyalty in Japan (84 percent), followed by Western Europe (73 percent) and the U.S. (66 percent).

In terms of passenger-car safety development, the S-Class plays an outstanding role as a trendsetter for the entire auto industry. Its pioneering advances in the area of passive safety include the ABS anti-lock braking system, which made its debut in the S-Class in 1978. In 1981, airbags and belt tensioners were offered in this production series for the first time. Groundbreaking concepts for dynamic handling such as ASR, ESP and AIRMATIC followed. The latest 220 series S-Class includes more than 30 new developments, for which a total of 340 patents have been registered. The PRE-SAFE occupant protection system in particular, which recognizes potential accidents in advance and can activate preventive protection measures, heralds a new era of vehicle safety. The entire spectrum of unique features of the S-Class has been honored with numerous national and international awards.