Kia Has Best Sales Month Ever; Rio, Optima Also Set Sales Records

    IRVINE, Calif., April 3 With sales of 19,159 units in
March, Kia recorded its best sales month ever, outpacing March 2000 sales by
51 percent.  Kia's year-to-date sales of 44,337 units are up 27 percent from
last year.

    Among individual models, both the Rio subcompact sedan and Optima midsize
sedan set monthly sales records.  Rio sales totaled 5,162 and Optima sales
totaled 2,125.  The top-selling Kia model in March was the Sephia compact
sedan with sales of 5,871.

    Kia Motors America is the U.S. sales, marketing and service arm of Kia
Motors Corp. in Seoul, South Korea.


                            MONTH OF MARCH             YEAR-TO-DATE
    Model                  2001        2000         2001         2000

    Optima                2,125         n/a        5,038          n/a
    Rio                   5,162         n/a       12,234          n/a
    Sephia                5,871       7,178       12,568       18,572
    Spectra               1,864         n/a        4,963          n/a
    Sportage              3,887       5,156        8,952       12,777
    Sportage 2-Door
     Convertible            250         395          582          915

    Total                19,159      12,729       44,337       32,264