A brand new sports coupe with a V8 heartbeat will catch the interest of most of us, but what if it’s built by Kia? It’s tough to know but the Korean carmaker might be willing to find out, if recent reports prove true.

Kia has a new K9 sedan coming up in its future with plans to sell it from next year. This K9 platform may lend itself to a rear-wheel-drive layout and even a V8 engine. But Kia wants to get even sportier and apparently will release a pair of RWD coupe concepts to check public interest and reception. Is it just crazy enough to work? Kia plans to find out at the Frankfurt Motor Show with its first coupe and then reveal a second concept at the Detroit Auto Show next January. If the hard-to-please V8 crowd think the concepts are the business then a production model could be ready for 2015.

Will Kia be a marque we see in the pages of NZV8 magazine in a few years time? It seems unlikely but with fewer and fewer V8 models currently in production – don’t rule it out.