Affordable Japanese Cars to Come to Korea

Nissan Motor of Japan is planning to export the “Cube” compact car, which is expected to sell for about 20 million won, to Korea next year.

An official at Nissan Korea said yesterday, “We are talking with the head office to import Cube. The price is expected to be the lowest among import cars.”

The import car industry believes that the price for Cube might be set below 20 million won, depending on the foreign exchange situation.

As compact cars and small cars are gaining popularity with the recent oil price hike, Japanese cars with a price tag of less than 20 million won are expected to be imported to Korea soon, bringing a major change in the country’s auto industry.

○ Cube for the Korean market

Cube is also known as “Hyori’s car” as pop singer Lee Hyo-ri drives it.

As Cube has attracted to young consumers with its cute design, about 1,000 units of the car have been sold even before the official import begins.

Known as Nissan’s “fashion icon,” the model is good for driving in the city, as it is a 1.5-liter small car with a short turning radius. It sold more than 42,000 units in Japan with the mileage of 15 kilometers per liter.

Nissan has produced the model only for the Japanese market with the driver’s seat on the right side. But, the company recently decided to produce the same model with its driver’s seat on the left side for the U.S. market in the latter half of this year. This also makes it possible for the automaker to export the model to Korea.

Meanwhile, Nissan Korea is also planning to import sports car “GT-R,” known as the best performing Japanese car ever. The price tag will be around 100 million won.

○ Small cars for high oil prices

Other Japanese carmakers, including Toyota, Honda and Mitsubishi, are also working to introduce their compact and small car models to the U.S. market, although they have been producing such models only for the local market.

Although car sales in the U.S. market in April declined nine percent from the same period last year, the sales of GM Malibu increased 39 percent. Sales of Hyundai Motor’s compact car “Accent” and “Elantra” grew 41 percent and 22 percent, respectively.

Daimler, which has mainly focused on high-end models, also introduced a two-seater micro car “Smart for Two” in the American market. GM is also preparing for rolling out GM Daewoo’s “Beat,” watching the response of the U.S. market to its Smart model.

Against this backdrop, imports of Japanese compact and small cars to the Korean market are expected to soar.

For starters, Daewoo Motors intends to import the popular Mitsubishi compact car models, “i” and “eK,” immediately after the models with the left-side driver’s seats are rolled out.

Also, imports of Honda’s famous “Fit” and Toyota’s “iQ,” which is attracting attention in the United States even before its sales begin, are likely.

The local price range of aforementioned compact cars is 8 to 12 million won in Japan. After being imported to Korea, they are expected to be sold for about 15 million won, including tariffs, car-related taxes and dealers’ margin.

achim@donga.com mobidic@donga.com