Kia sales decline in the first month of 2022 as a result of the chips crisis
South Korea's second-largest automaker, Kia, said Friday that its sales fell 5.7 percent year on year in January, as the global chip shortage continued to affect its production.
The company said in a statement that it sold 212,819 cars in January, down from 225,733 units a year earlier, according to South Korea's Yonhap news agency.
It added that domestic sales fell by 11% on an annual basis to 37,038 units last month from 41,481 units a year ago, while exports declined by 4.6% to 175,781 from 184,252 during the mentioned period.
Kia said continued chip shortages and the spread of coronavirus variants had an impact on its car sales last month, adding that it would adjust production schedules to reduce the impact of parts shortages on its production.
"Kia's production began to improve in September, and the company will adopt a three-shift system at its Indian plant and launch new models in the first quarter to boost sales," the statement said.
For the full year of 2021, sales rose 6.5% to 2.78 million vehicles from 2.61 million units in 2020.