Kia Motors Corporation announced today its global sales figures for passenger cars (export sales, domestic sales and sales from overseas plants), recreational vehicles (RVs) and commercial vehicles for May 2011, recording a total of 207,839 units sold. This figure represents a year-on-year increase of 18.7%.
In May, Kia posted strong year-on-year sales increases in all of its overseas regions – 48.4% in North America (55,140 units sold), 28.8% in China (33,624 units sold), 19.2% in Europe* (41,139 units sold), and 7.0% in general markets* (39,924 units sold), while sales in the home market of Korea declined by 5.0% (38,012 units sold).
Cumulatively, through the first five months of 2011, Kia’s global sales have increased by 20.4% year-on-year to reach 988,011 units. North America has experienced the highest gain to date in 2011 of 42.4% (226,078 units sold) while the remaining regions have all shown strong cumulative double digit year-on-year sales increases: 17.6% in China (169,691 units sold), 15.9% in general markets (202,389 units sold), 15.5% in Europe (183,708 units sold) and 12.2% in Korea (206,145 units sold).
Kia’s best selling model in overseas markets for the month of May was the C-segment Cerato (known as ‘Forte’ in some markets) with 38,204 units sold. The Sportage compact CUV was the second best seller with 28,563 units delivered, while the Sorento mid-size CUV, B-segment Rio and Soul urban crossover vehicle followed with 18,459, 18,191 and 17,812 units sold, respectively.
Senior Executive Vice President & COO of Kia Motors Corporation, Thomas Oh, said, “Nearing the midway point of 2011, we are encouraged to see that customers’ continued changing perceptions about the quality, styling, performance and value of Kia products in positive directions has resulted in sales growth outpacing our initial annual forecasts. We look forward to maintaining strong momentum in all of our strategic markets in the coming months, buoyed by the arrival of the next generation versions of our popular Picanto A-segment and Rio B-segment vehicles in Kia showrooms around the world.”
