The World Car Awards and our 86 jurors from around the world recognize the widespread impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and extend our condolences to all those affected. In deference to that impact, we are respectfully limiting the reveal of the 2020 World Car Awards winners to announcement via digital media.
The Road to the 2020 World Car Awards concluded today with the declaration of the KIA SOUL EV as the 2020 World Urban Car.
“It is a great honor for us to see the Soul EV named as World Urban Car,” said Thomas Schemera, Executive Vice President and Head of Product Division at Kia Motors Corporation. “This is one of the hardest-fought competitions in the global automotive industry, proving that the Soul EV is a truly outstanding vehicle for drivers in towns and cities. This accolade is testament to the talents and efforts of a worldwide team, who all strive to create desirable, high-quality and practical cars that drivers love.”
This year’s winner was chosen from an initial entry list of eight cars from all over the world, then a short list of three finalists as announced on March 3rd. The 2020 Top Three in the World finalists are the Kia Soul EV, the Mini Electric and the Volkswagen T-Cross.
The World Urban Car award was introduced in 2017. World Car Awards Program co-chair, Mike Rutherford, commented, “The World Urban Car award is increasingly significant as these clever, comparatively small cars measuring up to 4.2m long are among the biggest-selling, most accessible, best value vehicles in showrooms across the globe.”
“The fact is that large towns and cities with limited road space/off-street parking facilities continue to attract more residents, workers and other visitors. With this trend in mind, the popularity of urban cars is growing – and can only grow further. These are the logical, affordable, real-world automotive products for the motoring masses.”
Vehicles were selected and voted on by an international jury panel comprising 86 prominent automotive journalists from 24 countries around the world. Each juror was appointed by the World Car Steering Committee on the basis of his or her expertise, experience, credibility, and influence. The international accounting firm KPMG tabulated the jurors’ ballots.
There were several stops along the road for the 2020 program, including one in Los Angeles in November for our sixth annual L.A. Test Drives event hosted by ZF.
Then, the World Car Finals were launched live in New Delhi, India from the Delhi auto show on February 5th when the Top 10 and Top Five finalists in five World Car Awards categories were announced.
The World Car Finals continued with the announcement of the Top Three in the World finalists on March 3, 2020.
The Road to the World Car Awards ends today with the announcement of the 2020 winners.
2020 marks the 15th year of the World Car Awards partnership with the New York International Auto Show. The show has been rescheduled until August 28 to September 6, 2020. The media preview days will take place on August 26th and 27th (credentials required). The World Car Awards will launch its 2021 program at this time instead of in Paris. The launch will include a preliminary list of eligible vehicles for the 2021 season.
The Global Trends Report, produced annually by Cision Insights and our partner Autoneum, is scheduled to be released later this year in lieu of the usual presentation during the media breakfast at the New York International Auto Show. The report is the culmination of research and insights across the past six months. Autoneum CEO, Matthias Holzammer said, “Delighting car makers all around the world with our products is what we are constantly striving for. It is thus a great sign of recognition that the majority of the top three award finalists are counting on our expertise and innovativeness in acoustic and thermal management. Once again, the World Car Awards prove that the road towards success leads through Autoneum!”
The World Car Awards program would not be possible without the support of our official partners: Autoneum, Brembo, Cision Insights, KPMG, Newspress, the New York International Auto Show and ZF. Thank you.
VIDEO: https://youtu.be/7FBOfuL6PKk
THE ROAD TO 2020 WORLD CAR AWARDS:
BEGAN IN FRANKFURT SEPTEMBER 10, 2019.
ENDED TODAY APRIL 8, 2020.