Renault Samsung sales chief pledges return of heyday

Renault Samsung Motors is the only car brand here that can go head to head with the powerful duo of Hyundai and Kia, its new sales and marketing chief said recently.

“Renault Samsung was once the No. 2 brand next to Hyundai-Kia. My goal is to revive its heyday and that’s also the reason why I moved to the company,” Park Dong-hoon, the carmaker’s new sales chief, said Thursday in his first meeting with reporters. 

“It may be difficult to lower car prices as much as Hyundai and Kia due to the economies of scale. Instead, we will keep focusing on product quality and durability overall.”

The former chief executive of the Volkswagen brand at Audi Volkswagen Korea joined Renault Samsung in August. Under his leadership since 2005, Volkswagen’s annual sales jumped from 1,635 to over 18,000 units in Korea.

Referring to his surprise relocation, he said: “I did all I could at Volkswagen. I decided to move to Renault Samsung to start a new challenge.”

In order to revive Renault Samsung’s sluggish car sales, Park pledged to strengthen the carmaker’s diesel lineup.

“Now a growing trend is diesel-powered vehicles. We have high expectations especially about the upcoming QM3 diesel,” he said of the compact SUV ― going by the name of Captur in Europe ― that will make its Korea debut later this year.

The carmaker plans to import QM3 vehicles produced at its parent Renault’s Spain plant, but Park hinted it could consider production in Korea when its sales are strong enough here.

Following its announcement to produce Nissan’s new Rogue compact SUV at its Busan plant from next year, the sales chief made it clear that the company had no plan to import models of the Renault-Nissan alliance.

“Korean production of the new Rogue is aimed at increasing output capacity at the Busan plant. In order to gain more profits, we need to develop a new car through Renault Design Asia,” he said.

Adding to the carmaker’s recent sales momentum led by the SM3 and SM5 sedans, Park also pledged to strengthen marketing activities for the high-end SM7, while ramping up efforts for the full-electric SM3 Z.E.

By Lee Ji-yoon (jylee@heraldcorp.com)