Faring Well in Mexico
Kia Motors Corp., South Korea's No. 2 automaker, is rapidly expanding its market share in Mexico despite rising concerns over U.S. President-elect Donald Trump's protectionist trade policies.
According to the data from the Mexican Automotive Industry Association on December 19, Kia sold 5,460 vehicles in Mexico in November, up a whopping 143 percent from the same month a year earlier. In the first 11 months of this year, Kia shipped a cumulative 52,082 units, more than five times the 8,906 vehicles sold during the same period last year.
By model, the Sportage SUV was the top-selling brand with sales of 16,909 units in the January-November period, followed by the Rio subcompact sedan with 11,356 units and the Forte compact sedan with 11,213 units.
Kia's sales in Mexico began to outperform the nation’s car market growth since it started operations of its Mexican plant in May this year. Kia's share in the Mexican auto market came to 3.7 percent last month, ranking eighth. Nissan Motor Co. of Japan was the market leader with a 25.1 percent share, trailed by GM with 18.9 percent, Volkswagen with 15.9 percent, Toyota and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA) with 6.4 percent, Ford with 6.2 percent and Honda with 5.5 percent. Hyundai Motor ranked 10th in terms of market share with a cumulative sales of 33,122 units this year, up 40.5 percent from a year ago.
Kia Motors aims to sell 55,000 vehicles in Mexico this year for a market share of 3.5 percent, which the company expects to be within its reach considering the current pace of sales.
Industry sources raise concerns that Kia Motors’ plant, which just started operation, may take a hard hit when the Donald Trump administration starts imposing stiff tariffs on Mexican-made cars in line with his election pledge. However, some say that it will be difficult to adopt stiff tariffs as U.S. automakers, such as Ford, GM and FCA, exported more than 1 million vehicles from Mexico to North America this year, showing the dependence on their production bases in Mexico.