Kia Sales Increase Almost 20% in First Semester of 2011

Kia Motors Corporation announced today its global sales figures (export sales, domestic sales and sales from overseas plants) for passenger cars, recreational vehicles (RVs) and commercial vehicles for June 2011. During the first month of summer, the Korean carmaker has shifted a record 216,106 vehicles globally, representing an increase of 17.4 percent over the same month of last year.

On a market to market basis, the carmaker did especially well in the North American market, where 38 percent more Kias were delivered last month. Among significant regions of the world, NA was followed by China with an increase of 26.6 percent to 33,749 units sold, and in Europe’s 24.8 percent increase (44,422 units sold). Things didn’t look as hot in the domestic market, as deliveries declined 5 percent in Korea.

Adding the month of June to the five others that preceded it this year, the results indicate a 19.8 percent year-on-year increase to 1,204,117 units.

As usual, the Cerato (Forte in some markets) is the company’s best-seller, with 38,119 delivered during the month of June. The Sportage compact CUV followed closely behind with 30,226 units delivered.

“Our June results are quite encouraging as we surpassed the one million unit global sales mark, putting us well on track to exceed our annual target of 2,345,000 vehicles set at the start of 2011. In the second half of the year, we look forward to the all-new Picanto A-segment and all-new Rio B-segment vehicles arriving in showrooms around the world, in addition to the start of production of the all-new Optima for North American consumers at Kia’s U.S. plant in the state of Georgia,” said Senior Executive Vice President & COO of Kia Motors Corporation, Thomas Oh.