Kia: Soul EV Will Increase Green Cred

MINNEAPOLIS – Kia's Soul EV, due next year in the U.S., is not an effort to match competitors' offerings or boost the brand's CAFE rating, but rather increase the automaker's environmental credibility.

The U.S. sales and marketing arm of the Korean automaker announces the electric vehicle, Kia's first ever in North America, yesterday at a '14 Kia Soul media event here.

"For us it's a bigger issue," Michael Sprague, Kia executive vice president-marketing, tells WardsAuto. "It's to showcase the brand as environmentally conscious."

Kia has sold the Optima Hybrid midsize sedan for two years in the U.S. and retails the all-electric Ray multipurpose vehicle in Korea, making the Soul EV "a natural progression," Sprague says.

"We launched the hybrid a couple years ago, and that's a nice steady flow of consumers coming in," he says. "It was on our mainstream vehicle, our No.1-selling vehicle. We're not ready to go (green) on the CUV/SUV side, so what's a natural place for (another eco-friendly vehicle)? It's the Soul."

The subcompact box, which up to now only has been offered with gasoline internal-combustion engines, is among Kia's top sellers in the U.S., racking up roughly 115,000 deliveries last year.

Kia is not divulging any details of the Soul EV, including expected range or the car's sales potential. Specifications will be revealed at an upcoming auto show, Sprague says.

EVs have sold in relatively low volumes since Nissan's Leaf debuted in the U.S. in December 2010.

While Nissan delivered 16,076 Leafs to U.S. buyers through September, the volume is well-below that of similarly sized non-EVs, such as Nissan's own Versa subcompact, which tallied 91,535 units in the same period. Fiat's 500e is expected to represent only a sliver of the 500’s U.S. volume, once the car hits the California market.

However, the U.S. sales pace of EVs in their early years exceeded that of hybrids, giving a glimmer of hope to the segment.

Plans for additional variants of the Soul are possible, although Sprague notes an open-air version is off the table. A production version of the open-air Soulster concept from the 2009 North American International Auto Show would have too narrow an appeal.

"It's a Southern California/South Texas/Florida type of vehicle," Sprague says, adding Kia strives to create cars with a global focus.

The '14 Kia Soul with 1.6L and 2.0L DI engines already is arriving at U.S. Kia dealers.

Sprague says to expect a 2013 Soul tally equal to 2012's 115,000. August's Korean labor strife hampered Kia's ability to build more of the previous-generation Soul, and '14 model builds were slightly delayed, too, he says.

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