Hyundai Automobile

News and notes from the North American International Auto Show in Detroit on Monday: Toyota Motor Corp. finally lifted the veil on its completely redesigned Prius. The big news: 50 miles per gallon. Spy shots leaked not long ago, but Toyota's Bob Carter, group division head and general manager, did titillate the standing-room-only audience with a few details about the new vehicle, due out in the U.S. and Japan this spring.

In the beginning, there was Hyundai, and it was without form, and darkness was upon the face of the brand. And it's still pretty dark. Yes, we're all very impressed with Hyundai's robust sales numbers, the company's monster 10-year warranty and the new Hyundai Genesis sedan, which was voted 2009 North American Car of the Year by a group of powerful and influential automotive journalists who were found sleeping under a bridge. But what does the brand mean?

In the beginning, there was Hyundai, and it was without form, and darkness was upon the face of the brand. And it's still pretty dark. Yes, we're all very impressed with Hyundai's robust sales numbers, the company's monster 10-year warranty and the new Hyundai Genesis sedan, which was voted 2009 North American Car of the Year by a group of powerful and influential automotive journalists who were found sleeping under a bridge. But what does the brand mean?

News and notes from the North American International Auto Show in Detroit on Monday: Toyota Motor Corp. finally lifted the veil on its completely redesigned Prius. The big news: 50 miles per gallon. Spy shots leaked not long ago, but Toyota's Bob Carter, group division head and general manager, did titillate the standing-room-only audience with a few details about the new vehicle, due out in the U.S. and Japan this spring.

IMITATION is the sincerest form of thievery, and no car is more sincere than the new Hyundai Sonata. The first car issued from the loins of a new billion-dollar factory in Montgomery, Ala. -- chances are you've seen the ads trumpeting Hyundai's investment in the right-to-work homeland -- the Sonata is to the Honda Accord what the tribute band Zoso is to Led Zeppelin, a startlingly faithful rendition of the original at state fair prices. But ultimately not very original.

HIS nickname is M.K., but you can call him Johnny Drama. On Monday, Chung Mong-koo -- the imperious, quality- obsessed chairman of Hyundai-Kia Automotive Group, who in seven years transformed the sleepy South Korean company into an automaking powerhouse -- admitted being involved in an embezzlement scheme that, according to prosecutors, funneled $136 million to a political slush fund. Chung was arrested April 28 after a monthlong investigation and has been in jail ever since.

The chocolate-brown leather is softer than a Hershey bar in a cop's back pocket. The topstitched upholstery across the dash and doors seems sewn with a needle borrowed from Miuccia Prada. The interior wood accents are carved from the most majestic lumber in the old-growth faux forest. If you didn't know better -- and really, Hyundai would prefer you didn't know better -- you'd think the South Korean company had been at this luxury-car business a long time.

Hyundai Motor America named Jong Eun Kim its new head of North American operations Monday -- the latest in a string of executive shifts amid stalling U.S. sales. Kim, who takes his new post Jan. 1, will replace Ok Suk Koh, who will top Chinese operations for Kia Motors Corp. Hyundai is the largest stakeholder in Kia. Hyundai spokesman Jim Trainor called the change a "normal rotation, not unusual to the way Hyundai does business."

As his bosses in Seoul struggled with bankruptcy last week, Dick Macedo was hurtling around a racetrack in Ventura, apparently worry free as he and other top brass at Kia Motors America Inc. spent a day feting automotive writers. Indeed, the South Korean auto importer's new sales and marketing chief insists that economic woes plaguing the parent company--the entire South Korean auto industry, in fact--have little impact on Irvine-based Kia's operations in the United States.

A 20-year-old man was shot and wounded Sunday after a traffic dispute turned violent in a shopping center parking lot, police said. Russell Lee Olivarez of Santa Ana was hospitalized in stable condition with a single gunshot wound to the lower left abdomen, Police Sgt. Dwight Moore said. He was fired upon five times with a small-caliber weapon by an assailant in a dark Hyundai automobile about 5:30 p.m., Moore said.

The chocolate-brown leather is softer than a Hershey bar in a cop's back pocket. The topstitched upholstery across the dash and doors seems sewn with a needle borrowed from Miuccia Prada. The interior wood accents are carved from the most majestic lumber in the old-growth faux forest. If you didn't know better -- and really, Hyundai would prefer you didn't know better -- you'd think the South Korean company had been at this luxury-car business a long time.

Hyundai Motor America named Jong Eun Kim its new head of North American operations Monday -- the latest in a string of executive shifts amid stalling U.S. sales. Kim, who takes his new post Jan. 1, will replace Ok Suk Koh, who will top Chinese operations for Kia Motors Corp. Hyundai is the largest stakeholder in Kia. Hyundai spokesman Jim Trainor called the change a "normal rotation, not unusual to the way Hyundai does business."

HIS nickname is M.K., but you can call him Johnny Drama. On Monday, Chung Mong-koo -- the imperious, quality- obsessed chairman of Hyundai-Kia Automotive Group, who in seven years transformed the sleepy South Korean company into an automaking powerhouse -- admitted being involved in an embezzlement scheme that, according to prosecutors, funneled $136 million to a political slush fund. Chung was arrested April 28 after a monthlong investigation and has been in jail ever since.

IMITATION is the sincerest form of thievery, and no car is more sincere than the new Hyundai Sonata. The first car issued from the loins of a new billion-dollar factory in Montgomery, Ala. -- chances are you've seen the ads trumpeting Hyundai's investment in the right-to-work homeland -- the Sonata is to the Honda Accord what the tribute band Zoso is to Led Zeppelin, a startlingly faithful rendition of the original at state fair prices. But ultimately not very original.

As his bosses in Seoul struggled with bankruptcy last week, Dick Macedo was hurtling around a racetrack in Ventura, apparently worry free as he and other top brass at Kia Motors America Inc. spent a day feting automotive writers. Indeed, the South Korean auto importer's new sales and marketing chief insists that economic woes plaguing the parent company--the entire South Korean auto industry, in fact--have little impact on Irvine-based Kia's operations in the United States.

Hyundai Motor Finance Co. said Thursday that it will move ahead this month with a public offering of $115 million in asset-backed securities. A spokesman for Hyundai said the company thinks that the debt offering is the first in the United States by any unit of a Korean manufacturer. Hyundai Finance, the in-house dealer and consumer lending arm of Korean auto maker Hyundai Motor Corp., said Salomon Brothers Inc. will be sole underwriter of the offering, set for Monday.

Police Tuesday arrested two more suspects in the slaying of a Tustin church elder and identified both as street gang members. They and another alleged gang member arrested Sunday are suspects in the shooting of David Eugene Thompson during a robbery at a South-Central Los Angeles telephone booth last week. The murder was witnessed by Thompson's wife, Namora. Shortly after 7 a.m. Tuesday, detectives arrested Tracy Carter, 18, without incident at his South-Central Los Angeles home, police said.