Hyundai Motor Co.’s Creta compact sport utility vehicle (SUV) has created a splash on the Russian roads, joining the top ten bestsellers in the first month.

According to Korea’s largest automaker Tuesday, the Creta cars rolling out of St. Petersburg in Russia sold 3,479 units and ranked sixth on the monthly chart last month. The compact SUV is Hyundai Motor’s strategic model specially adapted for the emerging markets. It was first produced and launched in India last year and remains the top foreign player in the market to date.

Car demand in Russia has been depressed amid recession in the country and sales are expected to stop at 1.4 million units this year, more than halved from 2.9 million units in 2012. Global car makers have been downsizing and withdrawing from the market.

The Korean car brand stayed untouched by the overall downturn and beefed up production in local facility under the order of group chairman Chung Mong-koo who has been betting on eventual pickup.

Hyundai Motor Co. and its smaller affiliate Kia Motors Corp. sold 180,000 units in the first eight months this year in Russia, down 13.3 percent on year, but well outperforming others in the local automotive market where sales contracted 14.9 percent during the same period. As a result, the combined share of Hyundai and Kia in Russia gained 0.4 percent on year to 20.1 percent this year. When the Creta was first launched in the country last month, the auto group’s market share reached 20.8 percent, up from 19.3 percent in the same month of 2015.

Sales of Hyundai’s flagship sedan Solaris (known as Verna in Korea) and Kia’s Rio (Pride) have also been strong. The Solaris sold more than 600,000 units in the January - August period this year, topping the best-selling car chart in Russia.

By Noh Won-myung

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