Volkswagen unseats Toyota as world's biggest automaker despite dieselgate

Dieselgate incident seems to have had little effect in the total sales of VW group

German auto giant Volkswagen Group came on top of Japanese automaker Toyota in the world's biggest automaker list 2016.

Volkswagen Group, comprising of major brands like Audi, Bentley, Bugatti, Lamborghini, Porsche, Seat and Skoda, sold 10.30 million vehicles worldwide last year registering a rise of 3.8 percent compared to the previous year. Meanwhile, Toyota, with brands including Lexus, Scion and TRD, sold 10.17 million vehicles across the world to become the second biggest selling automaker. Toyota's sales grew by 1.3 percent against 10.08 million car sales in 2015.

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Volkswagen Group secured the feat by dethroning Toyota which has been enjoying top position for the last four years. American auto maker General Motors, who has been on top of the list for seven decades before Toyota climbed atop in 2011, is yet to submit its global sales report. The report is likely to be released next week with an estimate of about 9.5 million sales.

The achievement comes after the notorious emissions scandal erupted on 18 September 2015. Volskwagen admitted to the US regulators that it programmed the cars to hide their true emissions while undergoing testing. The incident dented the image of the brand and the auto giant was struggling to steer out of the biggest business crisis in the company's 78-year-long history.

In the Q1 of 2016 itself, Volkswagen took lead in the sales over Toyota and it continued the positive momentum through the year. Strong sales from China were one of the key reasons for the spike in sales while only few VW's tainted diesel models were sold. Audi, Porsche and Skoda brands also helped VW to push its sales graph.

In 2015, Toyota sold 10.15 million units, as opposed to Volkswagen's 9.93 million vehicle sales. GM was at third position with 9.8 million units. According to the analyst, Volkswagen is poised to stay at the top for the next few years.