Rolls-Royce car sales surged 49% to a record high in 2021 despite the coronavirus pandemic as demand for luxury cars surged around the world, Reuters reported.

In an online presentation, Rolls-Royce CEO Thorsten Müller-Otvos said the automaker has sold 5,586 vehicles to customers in more than 50 countries, the highest in the company's 117-year history, despite all the volatility caused by the pandemic.

"In the luxury sector as a whole, the struggle was not so much focused on attempting to find customers, but rather producing enough product to satisfy huge customer demand," Müller-Ötvös said.

"Covid forced many people to ground, not to travel anymore and for that reason there is quite a lot of wealth accumulated and that is spent on luxury goods," Müller-Ötvös told Reuters. "We profited from that development."

"If you order a Rolls-Royce today, you will expect to take delivery of it about a year from now," he said.

British luxury car maker Bentley, a division of Volkswagen AG, said last week that it hit a record high in 2021 as global sales rose 31% amid strong demand for high-end vehicles.

BMW said last week that it achieved record sales of over 2.2 million BMW vehicles in 2021, surpassing 2019 sales despite a global shortage of semiconductor chips.

Müller-Otvos said that while chip shortages are a concern, Rolls-Royce's parent BMW has "made sure we can get all the chips we need to build our cars."