Share of Electric Vehicles on the Rise
One out of 10 vehicles sold at home and abroad by Hyundai Motor Co. and Kia Corp. this year was an eco-friendly car.
Hyundai Motor and Kia sold a combined total of 6,122,768 units from January to November 2021. Among them, 656,479 units or 10.7 percent of the total were eco-friendly cars. This is the first time that eco-friendly cars exceeded 10 percent of their annual sales. During the same period of 2020, eco-friendly cars accounted for 7.8 percent of their total sales.
The two companies' eco-friendly car sales grew 45.3 percent compared to the same period of 2020. The growth rate is much higher than their year-on-year total car sales growth rate of 6.3 percent this year.
By vehicle type, hybrid vehicles accounted for 49.9 percent with 327,438 units, followed by electric vehicles (224,067 units and 34.2 percent), plug-in hybrid vehicles (95,542 units and 14.6 percent), and hydrogen electric vehicles (9,232 units and 1.4 percent). In 2014, hybrid models accounted for 96.8 percent of their annual eco-friendly car sales. This year, their portion is expected to fall below 50 percent. On the other hand, electric vehicles accounted for 35.5 percent in 2020 after exceeding 20 percent in 2018 when their sales began in earnest.