1,000 Hyundai IONIQ EVs Sold In First 2 Months Of Availability In South Korea
During the first two months of availability in South Korea, Hyundai sold around 1,000 units of the IONIQ EV, according to recent reports.
Hyundai reps have revealed that the company expects to sell around 4,800 units of the electric model in South Korea in 2016, and that it already has around 2,000 more orders to fulfill there.
Considering that the pricing is a bit high, those numbers aren’t bad at all.
It’s worth remembering here that Hyundai has already revealed that regular battery pack upgrades will coming, with 2017 likely to see one in anticipation of the Tesla Model 3 launch there (whenever that will be).
What that means is that sales will likely improve as new model years are released, and as ranges are increased as a result. The model is already a fairly compelling one, thanks to its DC-fast-charging capability (up to 100 kW chargers) and its design — even with the current 28 kilowatt-hour (kWh) battery pack.
Push EVs notes: “While it’s clear that Hyundai doesn’t expect to make the IONIQ EV a mainstream electric car yet, it does have a good platform for the future. Hyundai just needs to upgrade the current 28 kWh usable battery capacity to at least 40 kWh. Since the Hyundai IONIQ EV is a very efficient electric car, it doesn’t need a very big battery, but 28 kWh is clearly not enough when 40–60 kWh batteries are going to get mainstream in 2017.”
It may be, though, that Hyundai pursues a different strategy once Tesla starts operating in South Korea, and rather than attempt to compete directly, it simply undercuts the Silicon Valley company on pricing by a large margin. We’ll have to wait to see if that’s the case though.
Hyundai is of course planning to release a number of other electric models in the near future as well, including the i30, which could complicate things somewhat.
Images via Hyundai
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