According to several un-confirmed reports, Kia is planning to release a range of performance sedans and hatchbacks over the next three years all under the “XR” badge.

The Kia-World blog is bringing you an exclusive preview of the first product badged as XR. The Korean carmaker dropped a considerable hint when it revealed this re-styled, XR-badged Kia Cee’d at a press gathering near the company’s Korean HQ.

Officially this is just a standard Cee’d with Kia’s accessory styling kit. Judging by the well-resolved nature of the bodykit and the discrete badging though, we’d say it’s likely that the production versions in Kia’s performance range will look very similar.

Although this car was powered by a stock normally aspirated engine, Kia sources told that engineers are working on both, turbo and supercharged engines for future models.

Turbocharged engines would be aimed at Europe and supercharged engines at the American market because of different customer demands,” the source said.

Kia says that it is currently operating a “glocal” (globalised, but local) growth strategy. Significantly boosting Kia’s brand image between 2005 and 2008 should help move the company into profitable growth by 2009, bosses say.

A high-performance sub-brand will be a part of this brand-building that Kia hopes will help grow sales from 1.32m in 2006 to 2.5m by 2010. Company bosses say they also want to boost European sales by nearly 100 percent from last year’s 308,000 to 609,000 in 2010.

The plans for North American are only slightly less ambitious, with an aim to go from 315,000 units to 627,000 over the same time frame. A new plant in Georgia, capable of building 300,000 cars annually, will be on stream by 2009.

Kia continues to push its sales higher and higher in Canada, where Korean cars are becoming more popular with each month. According to latest reports, the Korean second largest carmaker sold 3775 cars in Canada in May 2007.

Kia’s sales have increased 22 percent when compared to last year. In the same month a year earlier, Kia sold 3093 cars on Canadian soil. This is a very nice sales increase and proves that Kia cars are becoming better and better.

That Kia cars are quality and great to drive can be confirmed by many satisfied Kia owners around the world. But there are still many consumers out there who need to overcome a “cheap image” stigma. With new, even more attractive models coming out soon, those people will be able to change their opinions on Korean cars for sure.

Ok, let’s get back to the sales number, achieved last month. The star in the Kia’s Canadian vehicle lineup was a 7-seat Rondo crossover (or minivan)! Rondo has experienced its best ever month since it’s introduction a few months ago with a massive 60% increase over April’s figures.

A total of 954 Rondos were sold last month, while in a month earlier (in April), Kia dealers sold 595 units of Rondo. Since its introduction in November last year, Kia dealers already moved 2700 Rondos from their lots, which means, the Rondo is becoming one of the most popular mini-MPVs in Canada.

Hopefully, Kia sales will continue to rise through the year…

Sales of Korean cars in South Korean market soared last month. Sales were boosted by the highest consumer confidence levels seen in a year. Last month, the largest Korean automaker and fifth largest carmaker in the world, saw its monthly sales rising by as much as 7.7 percent compared to a year ago.

Hyundai’s domestic sales had risen by 19.1 percent while its exports increased by 4.7 percent compared to the same month from a year earlier. Boosted by last month’s spurt in sales, the company’s accumulative sales for the year reached 1.069.344 units, 2.8 percent more than a year earlier.

The company, which maintained a 50 percent take of the local automotive market for the second consecutive month, said that the continuing popularity of its passenger cars Avante, Sonata and Grandeur were vital in the sales rise.

The three passenger cars produced by Hyundai have held the top three positions in the best selling car category for five consecutive months. The company attributed the rise in exports to the increasing demand for its sport utility vehicles such as Santa Fe and Veracruz in North America and the launch of its compact car i30 in the European market.

The company’s affiliate automaker, Kia Motor Corp. also saw its sales rising by 7.7 percent during May. However, unlike Hyundai, which saw a much larger sales increase on the local market, Kia’s exports rose by 8.8 percent while its domestic sales rose by a relatively low 3.4 percent.

Hyundai and Kia plan to launch a veriety of new models to further boost their sales at home and abroad in the next couple of months. Kia will soon launch an all-new Borrego SUV and facelifted Picanto, while Hyundai may soon redesign a facelifted Sonata.

Kia Motors America announces best May sales ever!

Kia Motors America today announced it has achieved the best May sales ever with the number of new cars and SUVs totaling 28.494 units. The number represents an impressive 7.5-percent increase over the sales numbers achieved in the same period last year.

Year-to-date Kia car sales totaled 128.104 units, representing a 7.5-percent increase over the same period of last year. Sales for the month were led by the C-segment Kia Spectra sedan and hatchback with 8.512 units sold.

The Sportage compact SUV and Rio sub-compact sedan also achieved their best months of the year in May 2007 with sales of 4.678 units and 3.479 units, respectively. The latest model to the Kia line-up, the Rondo crossover, followed the trio with its best month of the year. More than 1.754 units of Rondo were sold in May.

“Once again our increasing sales, led by our award-winning pillar models, Spectra and Sportage, have yielded another best month ever,” said Len Hunt, executive vice president and COO of KMA.

“By staying true to our core promise of producing value-, safety- and quality-minded vehicles, and bringing new, design-oriented product to market in the near future, we are on pace for another consecutive record sales year.” added Hunt.

Here are Kia’s sales numbers for the month of May 2007:

MONTH OF MAY              YEAR-TO-DATE
Model                     2007         2006        2007          2006

Rio                         3,479        1,697       13,067       11,423
Spectra                  8,512        8,474       30,208       28,541
Optima                   3,712        4,761       17,675       15,272
Amanti                       748          493        4,014        2,805
Sportage                4,678        2,545       20,088       15,048
Sorento                  3,111        3,899       16,073       19,831
Sedona                   2,500        4,625       21,122       26,215
Rondo                     1,754          N/A        5,857          N/A

Total                   28,494       26,494      128,104      119,135