SEOUL– Kia Corp., South Korea’s second-largest automaker, said Tuesday its sales rose 14 percent last month from a year earlier despite an extended chip shortage.
Kia sold a total of 236,874 vehicles in December, up from 208,268 units a year ago on robust overseas demand for its SUV models, the company said in a statement.
Domestic sales climbed 5.7 percent on-year to 50,536 units last month from 47,789, while exports were up 16 percent to 186,338 from 160,479 during the cited period on higher demand for the Sportage, Sorento and Seltos SUVs, it said.
For all of 2022, its sales rose 4.6 percent to 2,903,619 autos from 2,776,359 units during the same period of 2021.
The annual sales are lower than the target of 3.15 million vehicles set early last year.
The company set a sales goal of 3.2 million units, including overseas sales of 2.6 million, in 2023.
Source: Yonhap News Agency