Kia planning Toyota LandCruiser rival

Kia is plotting a big, rugged SUV to take on the Toyota Prado – and it could be as big as the extra-large LandCruiser.

While the fourth-generation Kia Sorento seven-seat SUV has just been launched in Australia, it doesn’t have the towing capacity or go-anywhere capability afforded by a ladder-chassis vehicle such as the Prado and LandCruiser.

And a monstrous new 4WD from Kia that’s highly likely to be based on same platform architecture as Kia’s upcoming dual-cab 4x4 ute would provide just that.

Timelines for the big new Kia SUV are hazy, as they are for the ute on which it’s expected to be based, and the development challenges brought about by COVID-19 haven’t helped either, but 2023 is understood to be in the ballpark for its debut.

No name has been attached to the extra-large Kia SUV project either, but it would offer a dual-range transmission, locking diffs and oodles of ground clearance for hard-core off-roading duties.

Kia’s new flagship SUV is tipped to measure more than five metres long and would have stronger sales potential in Australia (and other markets like the Middle East and Russia) than the Sorento, given that Toyota sells more Prados and LandCruisers than Klugers here.

Hyundai confirmed its desire for an upper-large off-road SUV to carsales in 2018 and we understand development of that vehicle, which will also target the Nissan Patrol, has been underway for several years.

Together, the Korean sister brands Hyundai and Kia want to challenge Toyota’s dominance of the SUV and pick-up segments but, although they have plenty of powertrain ammunition in the form of hybrid, plug-in hybrid, twin-turbo V6 and even V8 petrol engines, most buyers of big and rugged SUVs prefer turbo-diesels.

Which is where the Hyundai group’s muscular new 3.0-litre inline six-cylinder engine could come into play.

Developed for Hyundai-owned luxury car brand Genesis, the straight-six oil-burner debuted in the upcoming GV80 large SUV, in which it offers beefy 204kW/588Nm outputs.

That’s more than enough mumbo to eclipse the Prado’s (and Fortuner’s and HiLux’s) 2.8-litre four-cylinder turbo-diesel (150kW/500Nm) and would also provide loads of pulling power and a towing capacity of at least 3000kg.

Therefore the new diesel six is likely to be deployed in the Hyundai/Kia ute twins and their closely related large SUV cousins.

“This engine… we can have so many applications,” Hyundai R&D boss Albert Biermann told carsales earlier this year.

“We make also commercial vehicles and so on, so this engine will be out there for quite some time.”

Of course, Kia already has an SUV bigger than the Sorento, the Telluride, which is the sister vehicle to the eight-seat Hyundai Palisade – a vehicle that has been confirmed for Australia late this year.

However, like the Kia Sorento and Hyundai Santa Fe, both vehicles are based on a car-like monocoque platform and therefore aren’t as adept at towing and off-roading as SUVs underpinned by a ladder-frame chassis.

Kia Australia’s product planning chief Roland Rivero told carsales this week that while the Palisade is coming to Australia, it doesn’t change the Kia Telluride story.

“Hyundai is fortunate in that the Palisade is sourced from South Korea, whereas the Telluride is strictly built out of the Georgia factory in the United States. There’s no capacity to add another factory line to do right-hand drive,” he said.

“Telluride is off the cards in this current generation for right-hand drive. It’s doing extremely well in the USA and Canada, but unfortunately for us, we can't get it in right-hand drive.

“Are we missing out on Telluride? I think any market that doesn’t have Telluride would feel like they’re missing out.”

Kia's local product planning boss is acutely aware of what the brand needs to take the fight to Toyota, and that includes a big, rugged SUV with solid towing credentials.

While Rivero didn’t confirm anything outright, his positive tone suggests we'll see something sooner rather than later – perhaps in concept form initially.

“Our desire, if we were to bring in an upper-large SUV, would be a ladder-frame execution,” he said.

“The Australian market, the way they look at upper large SUVs are looking into LandCruiser or Prado territory and a ladder-frame SUV has specific capabilities, in off-road ability and towing capacity, that your monocoques just aren’t designed to deliver.

“If you did want to penetrate that particular segment, you’d have to have an offering closer to a ladder frame vehicle. Or if not, if it was alongside a large SUV, in that it was say built off a ute platform, they could achieve a similar result.”

“So it’d be a nice to have, if we had a ladder-frame SUV,” he said.

Watch this space.