Korea’s Kia sees 2014 Russian sales falling 5% to 188,000 cars

KALININGRAD, Nov 12 (PRIME) -- South Korean carmaker Kia Motors expects Russian demand for its cars to fall by 5.1% to 188,000 vehicles in 2014, Artyom Gusarov, managing director of Kia’s unit Avtotor, said at the launch of a full-cycle production of Kia Cerato on Wednesday.

“This year we plan to sell about 188,000 cars in Russia, and it will exceed the market fall. I believe that with the help of these sales we will become Russia’s second largest foreign producer,” he said.

More than half of the cars which are sold in 2014 will be produced by the Kaliningrad plant, he said.

Avtotor has cut its 2014 production growth forecast to 24% from 8.3%, the plant’s chairman Valery Gorbunov said.

“As far as we remember, our most successful year was 2012, (when we sold) 257,000 cars. In 2013 - 244,000 units, this year we will sell about 185,000 cars. The reduction does not mean the fall of capacities. We hope that the market will not get frozen so that we lose our jobs,” he said.

In August, Avtotor expected its output to decrease 8.3% on the year to 220,000 cars in 2014.

End