Renault will launch a new South Korea-built battery electric vehicle in 2028, with a new hybrid model arriving a year earlier, as the French OEM tries to reverse a 32% sales collapse at its Korean operation.

Executives laid out the plan at the 2026 Paris Motor Show this week. Renault Korea sold 47,231 units globally in the first nine months of 2026, down 32% year on year. Local sales fell 32% to 27,203 units. Exports dropped 32% to 20,028 units. That's a uniform decline across every channel, despite the recent launch of the Filante hybrid SUV.

The new models target exports first. Busan is the designated plant, and the stated goal is scale: more output, more shipments abroad.

What does this change for Busan?

Renault's director of global sales and operations, Ivan Segal, confirmed that South Korea "is a very important and strategic market for us" — but acknowledged the company can't lean on its existing hybrid lineup alone. He described the Busan plant as one of Renault's most competitive manufacturing sites for C- and D-segment vehicles globally. The stated ambition is to turn Busan into a major global manufacturing hub for those segments.

That's a positioning claim, not a confirmed capacity number. Renault has not published a production target, headcount plan or investment figure for the program. Watch whether one follows.

The technology package

Chief technology officer Philippe Brunet confirmed the new BEV will carry what Renault calls Level 2++ autonomous driving — an advanced driver-assistance tier short of full autonomy, handling steering and acceleration with driver supervision. It sits within the company's broader push to integrate artificial intelligence into its vehicles.

Renault is also developing an in-house urban navigation-assisted driving system, City NOA (Navigation on Autopilot), which handles guided driving on city routes.

Timing and what to watch

The sequence is fixed, at least on paper:

• 2027: new hybrid model joins the South Korean lineup
• 2028: new BEV enters production at Busan

Both dates were presented at Paris as plans, and BEV programs have slipped across the industry before validating them against firm production milestones.

What does this change for Renault Korea? Potentially a lot, if Busan output finds export markets. The operation's 2026 numbers show the urgency: nothing in the current lineup is holding volume. The Filante launch didn't stop the slide.

Watch next: confirmation of a production start date at Busan, any announced capacity or investment for the BEV program, and whether the 2027 hybrid arrives on schedule. First-quarter 2027 sales data will show whether the decline has bottomed out before the new metal lands.