An Odyssey resurrection? Honda Australia open a new Kia Carnival and Hyundai Staria rival

Honda Australia’s Odyssey might be coming to an end, with the last remaining new models expected to sell out by the end of the year, but the brand is open to a returning to the people-mover segment in future.

Speaking to CarsGuide at the launch of the new-generation HR-V, Honda Australia boss Stephen Collins said the brand would “absolutely” reintroduce the nameplate if a suitable new version surfaces.

“If there was a model available to us, absolutely,” he said.

“Don’t get me wrong, right now, there’s not.

“I think on average if you took the whole lifecycle of Odyssey, we were probably doing 120 a month or something a month – with ups and downs.

“It’s a small but stable segment, but we love that car.”

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The history of the Australian Odyssey is a little complicated, as there are actually two versions of the car globally – one produced in and for the North American market, and the other for the rest of the world.

Honda Australia had access to the latter, which was produced in Japan, but with manufacturing winding down, the local division lost access to its Kia Carnival rival.

However, this fifth-generation Odyssey is still kicking around in China, where it is built in Guangzhou for that market, while the platform is also used for the Elysion produced in partnership with Dongfeng.

The US Odyssey meanwhile, continues to be built in Alabama, and differs from the international version as it wears a unique design and is powered by a 3.5-litre petrol V6 paired to a 10-speed automatic – a drivetrain shared with American-specific Honda models like the Passport, Ridgeline and Pilot.

The final-generation Odyssey launched in Australia in 2014 and was the leading model in its segment for that year, accounting for 26.6 per cent of volume (2552 sales).

However, sales peaked just the year after in 2015 at 2836, as the then-new third-generation Kia Carnival debuted to immediate commercial and critical success.

Honda Odyssey sales then started to taper off, and last year recorded 1143 new registrations compared to the Kia Carnival that notched up 5862 sales after launching in new-generation form.

However, Mr Collins said the Odyssey nameplate is still an important one, and the decision to discontinue the model was out of the Australian division’s hands.

“I’ve been at Honda twice actually; I remember the first time around launching the original Odyssey and back then it was a very cool car,” he said.

“We’re disappointed [we had to discontinue the Odyssey].

“I think forever and a day we were private [buyer] number one people mover, so its just the function of a global decision unfortunately.”