Hyundai Asia Resources, Inc. (HARI), the official distributor of Hyundai vehicles in the Philippines, started 2018 with a modest 3 percent growth from 2,817 units sold in January 2017 to 2,903 units in the same month of 2018. The Korean brand’s performance can be considered quite a feat considering it is the initial month since automotive taxes have been restructured (Note: Hyundai has not yet implemented TRAIN at this point. Their prices took effect in February 2018).

The Passenger Cars (PC) segment had 2,036 units sold for January. While Accent and Eon still uphold the largest share of HARI’s PC segment, Elantra substantially grew by 113 percent with unit sales of 219 this January from 103 units sold last January 2017. The PC segment is HARI’s top segment with 70 percent contribution to HARI’s sales this January 2018.

Meanwhile, Light Commercial Vehicles (LCV) segment drove the growth for HARI’s January sales. It recorded 867 units from 594 units sold last year of the same month, a substantial growth of 46 percent. Grand Starex is the top-selling brand for the LCV segment, which also grew at a record-high of 184 percent this January with 329 units sold.  Moreover, Tucson and Grand Santa Fe are also upbeat with its sales growth of 104 percent and 279 percent respectively.