Kia takes less than 2 years to cross 300,000 cumulative sales mark in India

Kia India on Thursday said it has become the quickest brand in the country to cross three lakh cumulative sales mark in the country.

The brand, which sells models like Seltos and Sonet, crossed one lakh sales milestone in July 2020, the next one lakh in January 2021, and the third lakh in August 2021.

It took the automaker less than two years to achieve the milestones.

The brand achieved the first one lakh unit sales in one year and clocked the latter two lakh in the same amount of time, signifying the high adoption rate of Kia cars among Indian customers, Kia India said in a statement.

The flagship product of the automaker, Seltos, remains the highest contributor with 66 per cent share while Sonet added 32 per cent to the sales. Besides, the brand sold 7,310 units of its premium offering, the Carnival during the period.

"Three lakh sales for Kia India is a strong affirmation of customer acceptance and their confidence in the brand and its offerings. Despite testing times, the Indian market has shown a strong rebound in demand," Kia India Managing Director and CEO Kookhyun Shim noted.

The company's extensive sales, after-sales service network, and pre-emptive measures like an end-to-end digitised sales process helped it minimise business risks and perform against all odds, he added.

"Over the last years, we have carefully identified the unmet needs of Indian customers and catered to them with premium, well-designed products equipped with segment-first features. We are confident that our best in class products and ownership experience will continue to exhilarate our customers," Shim said.

Since its entry in India, Kia focussed on narrowing the gap between affordability and luxury, with a wide choice of variants per model at an optimal price range, giving the brand vast market acceptance, the automaker noted.

In order to expand its reach, the brand aims to expand its footprint from the current 300 to 360 touchpoints, covering 90 per cent of the Indian market, including Tier-III, IV, and upcountry markets, it noted.

The Seltos became the 3,00,000th car to roll out from the company's manufacturing facility in Anantapur, which employs over 13,000 employees.

Over the past two years, Kia has invested over USD 2 billion, inclusive of the vendor park created near the plant.

In April 2017, Kia India signed a memorandum of understanding with the Andhra Pradesh government to build a new manufacturing facility at the Anantapur district. The South Korean automaker commenced mass production in August 2019 and has an annual production capacity of about three lakh units.