Volume Model
Ssangyong Motor’s long time dream has come true. The annual sales of the Tivoli compact sport utility vehicle (SUV) are expected to top 100,000 units next year, a significant number for a single car model. It has been 62 years since Ssangyong Motor was established in 1954.
There is a lot of work that the company will have to do. Along with the expansion of the global network, the company needs to urgently reset its production line in order to reinforce its supply. In this process, the union’s cooperation is desperately needed.
“The sales demand of the Tivoli is rapidly growing faster than expected. The company has raised its sales target this year to 60,000 units,” said Ssangyong Motor President Choi Johng-sik during a press conference before the Global Media Conference held in Rome, Italy, on May 27 (local time).
The figure is up 65 percent from the annual sales target of 38,000 units that the company announced earlier this year. As the demand of the Tivoli has increased at home and abroad, Ssangyong Motor raised the annual sales target to 35,000 units at home and 25,000 units in overseas markets.
President Choi expects that the Tivoli will see annual sales of 100,000 units next year when the company additionally launches its diesel and long-body versions. It means that the Tivoli will become a “volume model” for the company. In order to become a volume model in the auto industry, 100,000 units of that model should be sold. Only the model with sales of 100,000 units is considered to have market recognition.
Ssangyong Motor is targeting the European market. From the early stage of development, the traits and various demands in the European market were reflected to develop the Tivoli. Since the model belongs to the B-segment (subcompact car), which shows the most remarkable sales growth in Europe, the company believed that it has enough chance to win in the European market.
In fact, the sales of the SUV-B segment in Europe last year grew 49 percent to 690,000 units from a year earlier. Accordingly, the market share of the subcompact SUVs increased from 22 percent to 27 percent in the entire SUV market.