Riding a surge of commercial vehicle sales from its Freightliner Corp. heavy-truck group, DaimlerChrysler AG reported a 12% rise in car and truck revenues in 1999.

The world's fifth-largest automaker said total vehicle sales rose 6.6% to more than 4.8 million units from 4.5 million the previous year. The activity amounted to $149.4 billion in revenue during the first full year following the merger of Daimler-Benz AG and Chrysler Corp.
Sales at Freightliner, which includes Freightliner Trucks, Sterling Trucks, Freightliner Custom Chassis, Thomas Built Buses, and American LaFrance, increased by 50% over the previous year, the company said. The increase was due to generally robust heavy-truck sales and the company's ability to secure several key accounts, including truckload giants J.B. Hunt Transport and Schneider National.
DaimlerChrysler will release detailed financial statements for 1999 on Feb. 28.