ANN ARBOR: Hyundai is considering building another plant in the United States to meet rising demand for the South Korean company's vehicles, its top US executive said Friday.
"We are looking at the situation very, very carefully," said John Krafcik, president and chief executive officer of US operations.
The South Korean automaker has experienced strong growth in recent years as it expanded its product offerings and benefited from savvy marketing campaigns and trouble at its competitors.
Sales are up 20.5 percent so far this year while its market share has jumped to 5.2 percent from 2.98 percent in 2008, when auto sales collapsed following the financial crisis that pushed General Motors and Chrysler into bankruptcy.
Hyundai's sister company Kia has posted a 35 percent jump in sales so far this year, while its market share has risen to 3.8 percent from 2.02 percent in 2008.
Krafcik said Hyundai's US dealers could easily sell more vehicles but are hampered by shortages of the company's most popular vehicles.
The CEO cautioned that Hyundai has shifted its focus in recent years, and he couldn't predict whether the South Korean company's top management was prepared to build a second assembly plant in the United States.
"If this was the old Hyundai, there is no question, they would be building the second plant," he said during a meeting with reporters at the Hyundai-Kia America Technical Center near Ann Arbor, Michigan.
"But the focus isn't on volume. It's on building great cars," he said. "It's a long-term strategy."
Krafcik said Hyundai has been able to make adjustment in its Alabama assembly plant so it could build about 10 percent more vehicles this year than it did in 2011.
A new study by the Ann Arbor-based Center for Automotive Research estimated Hyundai supported more than 94,000 jobs in the United States and contributed over $7 billion to the US economy this year.
Included in the analysis were Hyundai's manufacturing and suppliers, research and development, engineering, headquarters and dealership operations.
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