Once upon a time there was a car maker called SsangYong. It hadn’t always been called SsangYong – in fact, it had started life in 1954 as Dong-Hwan Automobile Manufacturing, before changing its name to Dong-A Motors in 1977, so clearly name changes are not an unusual thing. By the late 1980s, SsangYong was starting to sprout wings and move beyond its home market of South Korea. In that, it was accompanied by its fellow Korean expansionists Hyundai, Kia and Daewoo.
Fast forward a few years and Hyundai and Kia have come to dominate global motoring and the Irish car market in particular. Daewoo was subsumed into, and eventually consumed by, General Motors. And SsangYong?
There were some early stirrings of interest. The original SsangYong Musso might have been ugly but it was more capable than many early 1990s rivals. Ditto the later first-generation Rexton. But in spite of the general move towards SUVs, the SUV-only SsangYong brand stuttered and stalled and passed through multiple owners – Daewoo, briefly; then China’s SAIC; the India’s Mahindra and, now, finally, since 2022, it’s back in Korean ownership as part of the vast KG Group.
Hence the latest name change, to KGM, which stands for KG Mobility, but which the company would prefer you to think of as Korean Genuinely Made. Cheesy, but also a sign that KGM is keen not to be confused with an arriviste Chinese brand – in fairness, it’s sitting on 70-some years of car-making heritage.
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For all that KGM wants us to place hopes in the heritage, the company is also on the reinvention trail. While older, clunkier models such as the big Rexton SUV and the Musso pickup remain on sale for now, KGM is renewing and modernising its model line-up, starting with last year’s Torres and continuing with this new Actyon.
You can pronounce that as either Action or Ack-tee-on according to taste, but from a company replete with name changes, this one’s actually a recycled name. Actyon was originally used back in 2006 for a fastback-shaped compact SUV that looked distinctly odd, drove fairly dreadfully and which had one of the worst automotive interiors we’ve ever come across. At least that original Actyon had the dubious honour of being one of the (possibly the) first SUV-coupes ever to hit the market.
KGM reckons that this new Actyon is also an SUV coupe, but frankly that’s just overloading the circuits of vehicle nomenclature. Yes, it’s sleeker than the Torres with which it shares a chassis and engine, but this is no coupe. What the Actyon is is really rather good looking.
As with the Torres, it gets slim lights up front, chiselled styling all over and, at the rear, a faint visual similarity with the Range Rover Velar. Okay, so you’d need to be in a dark alley on a new-moon night and have broken your varifocals to confuse the Actyon with the Velar, but at least the two visually occupy the same ballpark. A dark ballpark. On a new-moon night. When you’ve ... you get the idea.
We’re not sure what the weird grab-handle appendages on the bonnet do, but otherwise the Actyon is a good-looking SUV, and that extends to the interior, which is, against type for SsangYong, genuinely impressive.
Everywhere you look there’s nappa leather, contrast red stitching and even some nice wood trim (albeit that’s spoiled by a ham-fisted gap in the wood panel that runs across the dashboard, one for which my old woodwork teacher would have thrown me out of class).
The Actyon’s cabin looks smart, is spacious and practical (tonnes of rear legroom, massive 668-litre boot) and is well made (some cheap plastics, but that’s true of nearly every car this side of a Rolls-Royce these days). The big screens look slick, although, as ever, the central screen needs some proper buttons to help it overcome inherent lagginess and a confusing layout.
However, there may be some difficulty, in the Irish market, with the Actyon’s engine. Unlike the chunkier Torres, which comes in electric form (borrowing a battery and electric motor from BYD), the Actyon is petrol-only, using a 1.5-litre turbo engine with 163hp and 280Nm of torque, driving the front wheels through a six-speed automatic gearbox.
Which sounds fine, but then you realise that there’s no hybrid system, not even a mild-hybrid, and that the Actyon has CO2 emissions of 194g/km. That makes for a distinctly unappealing €790 annual motor tax bill, which while it was not unusual for some cars not so long ago (anyone with a 1.8-litre MkII Ford Mondeo would have paid that, and still does) seems absurdly steep when a 727hp BMW M5 plug-in hybrid can be taxed for €140. More significantly, so too can the MG HS plug-in hybrid, the BYD Seal-U ‘super hybrid’, the Kia Sportage PHEV and the Toyota RAV4 PHEV – all direct rivals to the Actyon.
That would be kind of fair enough if the Actyon displayed the kind of simple ruggedness hitherto displayed by its SsangYong forebears, but it kind of ends up falling between two stools. Initially, the Actyon seems smooth and refined to drive, and the engine is notably refined until you ask for full throttle.
When that throttle request is accepted, the front tyres just give up the ghost entirely and start spinning and scrabbling for grip, even on a dry surface. That doesn’t bode well for a brand whose customers often expect their cars to be able to deal with mud-strewn country roads and farm tracks. A four-wheel drive version? Don’t hold your breath.
Equally, the Actyon rides poorly (especially on those country roads) and is thirsty – good luck equalling the claimed 8.5-litres per 100km fuel consumption figure.
Which leaves the Actyon and KGM in something of a quandary. The Actyon looks slick enough inside and out to bear comparison with the likes of the Kia Sportage and certainly the MG HS.
But the lack of dynamic polish leaves it floundering, and the poor economy and high emissions mean there is little in the way of rescue.
If KGM can price the Actyon low enough, say lower than the incoming Dacia Bigster, it may stand a chance, thanks largely to its handsome looks. If it’s pricier than the Dacia, it’ll probably sink without trace in the Irish market, which would be an unfair ending for a car that does a lot well but which falters in key areas.
Lowdown: KGM Actyon
Power: 1.5 T-GDI: 1.5-litre four-cylinder turbo petrol engine with 163hp and 280Nm of torque driving the front wheels through a six-speed automatic gearbox.
0-100km/h: 10.8 secs.
Emissions (motor tax): 194g/km (€790).
Fuel consumption: 8.5l/100km (WLTP).
Price: TBA.
Our rating: 2/5.
Verdict: The Actyon looks good, and has an impressive cabin and practicality, but it’s scuppered by its ride, traction and thirst.
