Hyundai i20 will be delayed

"There has not been too much forward progress ... it is still the subject of a fair bit of hard work and analysis," Hyundai Australia's director for sales and marketing, Kevin McCann, says. "We still have the strong intention to launch the car in the very near future but it is a very complex process.

"There was a decision made to get the car. That decision has not been unmade but we do have to get through some issues and challenges before we can implement it."

While insisting that the i20 will be launched as soon as possible, McCann concedes that the arrival of the small-car sibling to the company's highly successful i30 models could be delayed until the middle of next year.

"There is an outside risk that it could take that long — and I certainly wouldn't step back from that," McCann says. "The stated plan is still for later this year but that goal is becoming more elusive as time goes on."

The major stumbling block to getting the i20 — designed at Hyundai's Russelsheim studio in German and built at the Chennai plant in India — is negotiating a factory exit price that will keep the car competitive in the Australian market.

"It definitely comes down to the very tiny gap between the cost of the car (out of the factory) and the price of the car (in Australia)," McCann says. "We have said before that we see it as head to head with the volume end of the segment — that being the leading Japanese models (Toyota Yaris, Mazda2 and Honda Jazz) — and that continues to be the strategy. The Getz will remain a fixture at the price-leader end of the market."

McCann confirmed that for Australia, unlike most world markets where the i20 has replaced the Getz, the new model will take the place of the slow-selling Accent.

While conceding that the delays in the i20 were disappointing, McCann is adamant that Hyundai has not missed the boat with regard to the opportunity to leverage off the success of the i30.

"It is not a segment in which people will wait, but neither is it a segment where you will miss out on people forever if they choose not to wait," McCann says. "There are always new buyers coming into the market and I don't believe a delay of three or four months from the original plan is going to cause us to lose a volume opportunity.

"It is taking longer than we would want, but at the same time we have some other exciting new models that we will have to fit in as well."

One of the most crucial new models is the replacement for the Tucson compact SUV, the ix35 which will highlight the company's new design language as highlighted on the ix-onic concept car at the Geneva motor show earlier this year.

The ix35 is expected to arrive in Australia early next year after its official unveiling at the Frankfurt motor show in September.

Also due early next year is part of the next generation of the Sonata mid-sized car. The sleek sedan/coupe developed for the US market will be the first of the models to arrive and will be followed later in the year by the i50-badged sportwagon model developed specifically for European markets.

Towards the end of next year Hyundai is also expected to launch the sub-mini i10 into Australia.