Hyundai Motor, Kia plan to take lead in electrification, target auto sales to rise by 2% in 2024
Hyundai plans to take a lead in electrification and focus on optimizing profitability by strengthening its global electric vehicle (EV) production infrastructure, establishing flexible business strategies to adapt to market changes, and reinforcing preemptive risk management capabilities," Hyundai said in a statement. In 2023, Hyundai Motor and Kia managed to market 7.3 million automobiles, falling approximately 3% short of their collective goal of 7.52 million. This shortfall was predominantly attributed to challenging economic conditions marked by escalating interest rates and inflation, factors that rendered certain vehicles financially inaccessible for a portion of potential buyers.
During the previous year, Kia posted a new annual global sales record as the automobile company sold 3.09 million vehicles globally. As per Reuters, the previous best sales record of the company was 3.04 million vehicles in the year 2014. The corporation is targeting sales of 3.2 million units in 2024, up about 4% from last year.
Hyundai Motor has kept a more achievable target this time as the company aims a 0.6% rise in annual global sales to 4.24 million vehicles. "It seems that Hyundai's goal appears to be more conservative than Kia's ... Kia is set to launch new electric vehicles this year, but we need to factor in how the recent slowing growth of global EV sales would fold out," Shin Yoon-chul, an analyst at Kiwoom Securities told Reuters.
In his New Year address, Hyundai Motor Group Executive Chair Euisun Chung emphasized on customer satisfaction and the importance of making swift decisions. "The best strategy is earning the full trust of our customers, not quickly following our competitors ... In order to turn these external
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