Berlin, Mar 20 (IANS): Despite the Covid-19 pandemic, Porsche achieved record revenues of 28.7 billion euros ($34.14 billion) in the fiscal year 2020, the German sports car manufacturer announced on Friday.

Porsche's profit before tax also increased to almost 4.4 billion euros in 2020. In total, it delivered more than 272,000 vehicles to customers worldwide, down by three per cent compared to the company's best year ever in 2019, the Xinhua news agency reported.

"The financial year 2020 was successful for Porsche -- despite challenging circumstances," said Oliver Blume, chairman of the executive board of Porsche AG, in a statement.

Last year, "China was undisputedly the largest single market for Porsche," the carmaker stressed. Porsche, part of the Volkswagen group, delivered 88,968 vehicles to customers in China in 2020, an increase of three percent year-on-year. The Asia-Pacific, Middle East and Africa regions also "continued to show positive growth overall" last year, it noted.

Although vehicles sold in the United States declined by 7 per cent year-on-year in 2020, the United States remained the second-largest Porsche market.

In the European region, without Germany, sales of Porsche last year decreased only by 4 per cent year-on-year, while Porsche's home market Germany recorded a sales decline of 17 per cent.

In 2020, one-third of all Porsche vehicles delivered in Europe were fully or partially electric, and the figure worldwide was 17 per cent. Porsche is aiming for more than 80 per cent of its new vehicles to be electric by 2030.