South Korea's top carmaker, Hyundai Motor Co., and its smaller affiliate, Kia Motors Corp., saw sales of their mid-size cars in China expand in the first quarter of this year on efforts to sell more pricey cars to improve profitability, data showed Sunday.

Of the 440,514 vehicles the two carmakers sold in the January-March period in the Chinese market, the share of cars in the mid-size segment came to 81,311 units, or 18.5 percent, according to industry data.

Compared to a year earlier, the portion of mid-size cars out of Hyundai and Kia's combined auto sales in the country climbed 2.9 percentage points, the data showed. The overall share of mid-size cars for the two affiliates last year stood at 16 percent.

The car-making duo under the world's No. 5 auto giant, Hyundai Motor Group, said the sales shift to the higher-priced cars is favorable as it could help improve earnings.

"The rise in the portion of mid-size car sales is a positive signal in that it could lead to a steady gain in profitability," a company official said.

The increase in mid-size car sales came as the two carmakers began to change their sales tactics in recent years to popularize their more expensive cars, instead of compact cars, in the world's largest auto market. Hyundai sold nearly 200,000 mid-size cars in China last year, representing 17.8 percent of its sales there, according to the data. In 2008, the figure was 8.5 percent.

For Kia, the number came to 12.7 percent in 2014, compared to the 1 percent tallied in 2010, the data showed.

"From now on, instead of just increasing our overall sales figures, we will pay closer attention to expanding sales of high-profit segment cars, strengthening services, and fostering more outstanding dealers in the Chinese market," the official said. (Yonhap)