Kia will start production of the new EV4 in Slovakia at the end of August

Kia expects to sell up to 160,000 EV4 compact electric cars a year. Half of them should find buyers in Europe, so production will be started not in Korea, but at the plant in Žilina, Slovakia. The start of serial production is scheduled for the end of August.

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EV4 is Kia's first European-made electric car. The Ceed and Sportage models with internal combustion engines are already assembled in Žilina, and the EV4 will soon join them. Deliveries to customers will start in September. Hyundai Motor's neighbours already have similar experience: the electric crossover Hyundai Kona is produced at the plant in Nošovice, Czech Republic, just 80 kilometres away from Žilina.

The EV4 is built on a front-wheel-drive version of the E-GMP platform. Kia emphasises that it has been particularly thorough in testing the novelty's battery.

Only the five-door EV4 with a length of 4.43 metres will be assembled in Slovakia. The Fastback version, lengthened by 30 centimetres, will remain "Korean". The base version of the hatchback is priced at €37,590 - almost €10,000 cheaper than the Fastback.

Localisation of production is also important from the point of view of economic incentives for buyers of electric cars. So in France and the UK, all information is taken into account, including the origin of the battery and the country of assembly.

The company expects the electric hatch to repeat the success of the EV3. Only for the first half of the year Kia sold 37 thousand such crossovers. The new EV4 will have to compete with Volkswagen ID.3 and Renault Megane E-Tech Electric and try to strengthen the position of the brand: in the first half of 2025, Kia's share of the European market fell from 4.1 to 4 per cent.

Source: Autonews