Kia Australia makes room for small SUV

Kia has left little doubt it wants to introduce a new SUV to its Australian model range – slotting in below theKia Sportage mid-size SUV.

Kia Motors Australia COO Damien Meredith told Australian journalists during this week’s launch of the updated Kia Sportage that the smaller model is around 18 months away.

It will be priced somewhere between the Kia Cerato small car (from $19,990) and Sportage (from $29,990), and pricing of the latter has been lifted to leave clear air ahead of the new SUV's projected launch.

That's if it comes here. So far, Meredith and his colleagues at Kia Australia are not actually confirming that the new SUV will launch in Australia, just that they dearly want to sell it in this country.

"We're hoping that there'll be a smaller SUV come to play for Kia within the next 18 months," Meredith explained.

"We want to protect the price plateau for that car, so you've got Cerato, and then you've got hopefully the price plateau for this smaller SUV to come, and then you've got the pricing of Sportage... and Sorento."

Meredith says that the $1000 base price increase for the 2018 Kia Sportage leaves more room for the smaller SUV in the line-up below Sportage, "for when or if the smaller SUV does arrive".

The new vehicle "won't be Niro", according to Meredith, but the Kia Stonic has also been ruled out for Australia by his colleague, general manager of communications Kevin Hepworth.

Around this time last year, Hepworth told motoring.com.au that the Stonic (pictured) wouldn't be the new small SUV that's on the agenda for Australia in late 2019, although it could be a different version of it.

Meredith has previously told motoring.com.au that Niro would be too close in size to Sportage for the sums to add up, which supports his remarks this week about a price plateau for the small SUV.

Hepworth last year effectively said that the Rio-based Stonic – a close competitor in Europe to a car like the Renault Captur – would not have the necessary performance Australians demand from even the smallest of cars.

That would make the new vehicle a third 'B-segment' SUV model from the Kia stable.

At the other end of the SUV scale, Meredith has basically knocked on the head any possibility of North America’s upcoming Telluride — a big new eight-seat SUV — going on sale here.

"Couple of things that might be against us; it hasn't been developed in RHD [right-hand drive], and my understanding is... it's monocoque [construction]..." he explained during a Q&A session.

Subsequently asked by motoring.com.au why monocoque construction is necessarily a hurdle for the large SUV, given Mitsubishi's experience with the Pajero, Meredith explained that "[from] moncoque body to ladder structure, there's a significant amount of difference between what you can pull and what you can't pull."

Furthermore, having been developed for the North American market, the Telluride may not be available with a diesel powerplant, which would make it difficult to sell.

Nevertheless, Meredith says that Kia Australia might consider the large SUV for local sale, "if Telluride came with RHD”.