There had been a lot of speculation when Kia confirmed that a new pickup truck was coming to America that is not the Tasman. One of them was a Kia-badged truck from Hyundai's collaboration with GM, or maybe a Sportage-based truck a la Hyundai Santa Cruz. But the Korean marque has other plans and officially reveals what it will introduce to North America: an electric truck.
Kia is a South Korean automaker headquartered in Seoul. It was originally founded in 1944 as a bicycle manufacturer which later built small motorcycles, and Mazda-licensed trucks and cars. After building an assembly plant in th early 70s, the company also produced the Bisa range of cars until 1981 before coming to a half due to the political situation at the time. Production kicked off again in 1986 in partnership with Ford, and in 1992 the company started sellling cars in North America. Today it is the second-largest automaker in South Korea, right behind Hyundai.