Kia India bullish on long-term growth potential of utility vehicle segment

Kia India is focusing on the utility vehicle segment in the Indian market as it remains bullish on the long-term growth potential of the vertical. The automaker currently sells products such as Seltos, Sonet and Carens in the market, and also plans to keep on offering diesel trims on its models as demand remains robust for such variants.

The company expects its sales this year to grow by around 10 per cent buoyed by its presence in the utility vehicle segment. It sold a total of 2,54,556 units in the year 2022. "Our focus firmly remains on multi-purpose vehicles and sports utility vehicles," Kia India National Head - Sales and Marketing Hardeep Singh Brar told PTI.

He added that the company remains bullish on the SUV and MPV segments and does not have any plans to introduce sedans in the market. He noted that the contribution of the SUV segment in the overall passenger vehicle sales has gone up to 43 per cent in 2022 from 24 per cent in 2018.

The multi-purpose vehicle segment's contribution in the carmaker's total sales has also grown from 5 per cent in 2018 to 9 per cent in 2022. Sedans earlier used to contribute 19 per cent to the overall PV industry in 2018 which went down to 10 per cent in 2021.

Speaking about the diesel car segment, Brar noted that diesel trims of Sonet and Seltos currently contribute around 30-35 per cent to the overall sales of the two models. "When you look at the industry perspective, diesel vehicles currently contribute almost 19 per cent of the overall sales. The diesel contribution however remains robust in the SUV vertical," he noted.

He added that the contribution of diesel cars in the industry sales has grown from 17 per cent in 2020 to 19 per cent in 2022.