South Korea’s largest automaker Hyundai Motor Co. and its smaller sibling Kia Motors Corp. bank on their four new cars slated for launch in the latter half of the year to bolster sales dragged down by multiple scourges at home and abroad.

According to the firms Tuesday, they plan to release four new vehicles this year, doubled from last year when Hyundai Motor released the IONIQ and Kia Motors the Niro. The new cars will be brand new models, neither facelifted nor fully-changed versions of predecessors.

The carmakers hold high hopes for the upcoming new cars as their combined worldwide sales contracted 5.8 percent in the first four months of this year to 2,323,234 units from a year earlier. The on-year drop is largely to blame on a huge cut in their China sales on diplomatic row over Seoul’s deployment of the U.S. antimissile system. The Korean automakers also saw their share retreat to 7.6 percent recently from 8.1 percent last year in the U.S. car market amid fierce competition. Their domestic shipments also dropped 2.3 percent in the January - April period to 387,645 units from a year-ago period.

Among the four new cars, Kia Motors’ Stinger will make debut first with its preorders starting on Thursday. The fastback sedan comes with 2.0-liter turbo and 3.3-liter turbo gasoline engines and eight-speed automatic transmission. Both rear and four-wheel drive versions are available. The 3.3-liter engine-fitted model is capable of hitting 0-60 miles per hour (mph) in a mere 5.1 seconds.

Hyundai Motor will roll out its very first compact sport utility vehicle (SUV) Kona in June, and Kia Motors will release all-electric SUV Stonic in the following month. The final model that will hit the market this year will be the G70, first model newly developed for Hyundai Motor’s stand-alone luxury brand Genesis since the launch of the brand in late 2015. The G70 is expected to be released in September.

By Park Chang-young

[ⓒ Pulse by Maeil Business News Korea & mk.co.kr, All rights reserved]