Kia welcomes commercial vehicle revival

Kia has been polishing its brand image in recent times as a company offering quality passenger cars and SUVs at an affordable price.

What many forget is that in the past the company also sold commercial vehicles like the Pregio van (pictured) and K2700 light truck, when the brand was being distributed in Australia by Ateco Automotive.

Kia could once again move into the business of selling commercial vehicles here, says Damien Meredith, Chief Operating Officer at Kia Australia. It all depends on whether Kia will develop its own version of the Hyundai Santa Cruz and then offer it in right-hand drive for the local market. Meredith says the company would be "very keen" to lay hands on a right-hook ute for sale in Australia, and the issue is not whether Kia would build its own version, but whether parent company Hyundai would commit to build it at all.

"If it happens and when it happens, we'll be first in line to put our hand up and say: 'we require a light commercial line'," he told motoring.com.au during the launch of the Picanto this week.

"If the group came up with a light commercial range, it would be offered to both Hyundai dealers and Kia dealers."

When asked whether selling commercial vehicles once more posed a threat to the careful honing of the Kia brand in recent years, Meredith – who has also worked for Hyundai Australia in the past – turned to that company's iLoad for an analogy.

"I think, if I can use the iLoad as an example… when the iLoad was launched in Australia it helped the Hyundai brand.

"It was semi-bonneted and it had advantage in that van segment, there's no question about that.

"If we ever did come up with a light-commercial range we'd do it the right way. I'd be very confident of that, and we would compete very well with the Toyotas, and the Mitsubishis, and the Nissans and the Mazdas in Australia.

"Someone was telling me the other day that when Pregio was in play that it was doing 300 [sales] a month, which was quite amazing. But then again, you've got to be corporately responsible and make sure that what comes in complies to safety, complies to CO2, complies to a lot of things."

Kia stopped selling the Pregio in Australia because it couldn't match new emissions control legislation.

"Typically, what we want to do is benchmark ourselves against the best," says the Kia exec. Meredith agreed that the BT-50 has done no harm to Mazda's brand image, which indicates that Kia could – and should – follow suit.