Kia Motors India to invest Rs 400 crore more in Andhra Pradesh

Kia has confirmed an additional investment of $54 million (Rs 400 crore) for expanding its Anantapur facility in Andhra Pradesh.

By Nilesh Wadhwa

28 May 2020

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Kia Motors India's 300,000 units-per- annum plant in Anantapur, Andhra Pradesh, is expected to achieve full capacity utilisation by 2022.

In just 8 months, Kia has taken an 8.97% share of the UV market with sale of 84,903 units (81,716 Seltos SUVs and 3,187 Carnival MPVs), becoming the new No. 4 UV player in India. It also exported 21,461 units in FY2020.

By Diwali or so this year, Kia will launch its third model, the Sonet compact SUV. The tech-laden Hyundai Venue and Maruti Vitara Brezza fighter, available with a wide variety of powertrains, is expected to carry a sticker price of Rs 700,000-11.5 lakh.

In FY2020, Kia Motors India manufactured 101,420 vehicles comprising 97,804 Seltos SUVs and 3,616 Carnival MPVs at its Anantapur plant in Andhra Pradesh.

Kia Motors India, the aggressive challenger brand in the country, today announced an additional investment of $54 million (Rs 400 crore) in Andhra Pradesh, where it has its manufacturing plant at Anantapur.

The announcement was made by Kookhyun Shim, CEO and MD, Kia Motors India at the Andhra Pradesh ‘Mana Palana-Mee Suchana’ program. He said, “We are happy to share that we will make an additional investment of $54 million for our upcoming project despite the Covid-19 pandemic.”

Kia, which is on a roll with the successful launch of the Seltos SUV and the encouraging response for the upmarket Carnival MPV, has an aggressive new product strategy in place. In August 2020, it plans to launch the Sonet compact SUV, a tech-laden Hyundai Venue and Maruti Suzuki Vitara Brezza fighter, available with a wide variety of powertrains, with an estimated pricing between Rs 700,000-11.5 lakh.

The Korean carmaker has already invested around $1.1 billion (Rs 8,141 crore) Anantapur, which has an existing 300,000 units-per-annum-capacity plant and the additional investment is expected further help the company ramp up production by around 100,000 to 150,000 units, as it expects to further increase sales and exports from the country.

CEO & Managing Director of @KiaMotorsIN Kookhyun Shim has issued a statement on investing further in Andhra Pradesh. An additional $54 million will be invested to manufacture SUV vehicles. This was announced in the “Mana Palana-Mee Suchana “ program. pic.twitter.com/0FEq3ISbPe
— CMO Andhra Pradesh (@AndhraPradeshCM) May 28, 2020