Karim Habib, head of Kia global design, stands with his hand on the Concept EV3 during the 2023 Kia EV Day in Seoul.Amid record new vehicle prices in Canada, Kia recently debuted three vehicles that will sell for lower prices and are aimed at a wider market than those currently offered by the company – at least if they arrive in Canada.
During a wide-ranging deep dive into the future of Kia’s global business, Kia officials noted that North America is well behind both Europe and China in the adoption of EVs, and these three vehicles are expected to tackle a common issue: affordability. Kia also has an even smaller EV2 crossover is in the works, which will be closer to US$30,000. Plus Kia is studying their cost structure on how to reach a US$25,000 price point, which the CEO said will likely require joint ventures with battery makers.For potential buyers of the EV5, the lower price doesn’t appear to affect range. The stated driving ranges in China’s lenient CLTC standards translated to about 470 kilometres for its all-wheel-drive version with a larger battery.
But there will be innovations coming even on these less-expensive models as well, suggests Kia. The production EV3 crossover will be the model that debuts the firm’s new artificial intelligence technology, which allows drivers to have conversations with the AI assistant to, for example, ask the vehicle to plan charging stops with restaurants along a route, or near a movie theatre.