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Just as the baby Soul hits Australia — after being rushed through months ahead of schedule — these pictures of the Korean company's new compact four-wheel drive have just surfaced.
It's the upcoming Sportage and it was caught in driving snow in freezing Scandinavia as engineers finalised the update package for the 2010 model which will be ready for showrooms in the back half of this year.
The biggest change is a six-speed automatic gearbox to go with the Sportage's 135-kiloWatt turbodiesel engine. The goal is to improve both performance and fuel economy in an engine which is becoming more and more important to Kia.
But Kia is tied to Hyundai on product development and that means the same package is likely to be seen in the next update of the Hyundai Tuscson, which is twinned with the Sportage.
The updated turbodiesel powertrain will find its way into other Kia models sold in Europe, although there is no firm plan to use it in the latest compact Cerato in Australia.
The Sportage update is only a mid-life tickle but is important for a vehicle which has been its most successful since it was introduced in 1995. The current model was only introduced with a full model change in 2005.
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