Hyundai sales growth anticipated to be lowest in decade for 2016

Kuala Lumpur/Seoul: Largest automobile manufacturers of the South Korean region, Hyundai Motors and its affiliate Kia have anticipated that 2016 will mark the lowest Hyundai sales growth for the company over the decade, due to the falling automobile demands in the major market like China.

Hyundai Malaysia and Kia Malaysia also marked 2015 as the year of meagre sale units in the country. As per our, research Hyundai was able to occupy only 0.9 % of the total market share in Malaysia by selling only 5,122 units. Whereas Kia's market share in Malaysia was only 0.7% share by selling only 3,691 units. Hyundai recorded 13th position in a number of sale units which was followed by Kia at 14th position, which is quite dramatic for the Korean carmakers.

Chung Mong-Koo, who is currently heading the Hyundai Motor Group, said recently in a message to employees that Both Kia and Hyundai have estimated a combined sale of around 8.13 million cars across the globe in 2016, which is very less as compared to the 8.0 million units sold worldwide in 2015.

This marks the smallest sales growth curve in the decade since 2006 for the Korean carmakers, which is the world’s fifth-largest automaker. The major reason for this hit is the falling demands in the affluent market of China, which accounts for a massive sales chunk for the company, approximately accounted as a quarter of combined global sales.

Chung said, “Slow growth is expected to persist in the global economy due to weak growth in China, the slumping oil price and uncertainty in emerging markets over the rate hike in the US.”

Hyundai's share is expected to shrink up to 10% in China because of the growing influence of Japanese carmakers along with the brewing of national carmakers rolling out cheaper models.

Besides that the South Korean Won is also losing against the Euro, Japanese yen and Brazilian Real which is increasing the price competitiveness for the Korean manufacturing as compared to the Japanese makers like Honda and Toyota.

Chung Mong-Koo was present as the flag off event of the Hyundai’s newly launched luxury brand Genesis. The company is striving hard to enter luxury division by providing a cheaper alternative than its rivals like Toyota Lexus.

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