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Genesis cars win accolades, offer value — so why are sales so bad?

My high-school buddy Brent Cormier was so smitten with the Genesis G80 when he saw it at an event I hosted at SXSW in 2016 he bought a used 2013 Hyundai Genesis a short time later and fell in love with the car. "It surpasses my every expectation," said Cormier, a self-described "renaissance man" who owns and runs a real estate agency with his wife Laura, is a food service executive chef and part owner of Austin-based Thin the Herd Guitars. "I was locked into Mercedes and Audi for 10 years," he added. "And felt trapped in an endless pit of maintenance costs." After owning the Genesis over the past two years — including using it as an Uber and Lyft driver to earn extra cash — Cormier learned what some frugal luxury sedan buyers and a handful of car reviewers have discovered: Genesis offers great bang for the buck compared to other premium brands and can compete with the best in terms of performance, features and comfort. Hyundai's luxury brand also earned a prominent third-party endorsement last week when for the first time Genesis topped J.D. Power's 2018 APEAL study, surpassing German luxury-performance icon Porsche. The APEAL study (which stands for Automotive Performance, Execution and Layout) "measures owners' emotional attachment and level of excitement across 77 attributes," ranging from performance to comfort, and asks nearly 68,000 owners of new 2018 models to score vehicles on a 1,000-point scale. In its second year ranked as a stand-alone brand, Genesis earned an APEAL score that bumped it up 15 points to 884 and helped push it past Porsche — and past BMW, Lincoln, Mercedes-Benz, Audi, Volvo, Cadillac, Land Rover and Lexus, in order of ranking. Last month, Genesis also topped J.D. Power's Initial Quality Survey (IQS) for the first time this year. And both its models were awarded Top Safety Pick Plus ratings by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, among 11 Plus ratings in all for Korean vehicles. Despite high J.D. Power rankings and great reviews, Genesis U.S. sales were off 50 percent for the first six months of 2018 compared to 2017, and in June Genesis sold only 796 vehicles — the first time U.S. numbers dropped below 1,000 in a month. Part of Genesis's APEAL and IQS success can be attributed to its small product lineup: just two models, the G80 and G90 sedans, with a third, the 2019 G70, launching later this year. And while those numbers may help in J.D.

When Android Automotive goes in the dash, Google wins — and automakers lose data

You've gotta hand it to Google for the way the Silicon Valley tech giant has made indelible inroads into the car on multiple fronts. The most obvious is with its pioneering self-driving car technology that's caused car companies to get their act together on autonomous vehicles — and also collaborate with Google. Google has more directly extended its influence and data-mining capabilities into the car with its Android Auto smartphone-projection platform that most major automakers have adopted along with Apple's CarPlay. And now it's preparing to dig even deeper into dashboards by deploying its open-source operating system, Android Automotive, beginning with Audi and Volvo. Volvo recently announced that its next-generation Sensus infotainment system will run Android Automotive as an OS and include Google's Play Store for cloud-based content, Maps for navigation and Google Assistant for voice recognition, which can even command a car's climate control. By embedding Google in the dash, Volvo says owners will get an improved connected experience. "Bringing Google services into Volvo cars will accelerate innovation in connectivity and boost our development in applications and connected services," Volvo senior vice president of R&D Henrik Green said in a statement. "Soon, Volvo drivers will have direct access to thousands of in-car apps that make daily life easier and the connected in-car experience more enjoyable." Having Android Automotive onboard could benefit drivers — and provide a big win for Google, since it opens a deep and lucrative new data-mining vein for the company. But it's a wave of a white flag for car companies when it comes to delivering their own cloud-based content and services. It also represents a massive data giveaway and, for Audi, a reversal of earlier reservations about letting Google get too much access to car data. Not long after Android Auto and Apple CarPlay were introduced in 2014 and most automakers eagerly embraced the technologies, several German automakers second-guessed their decision when they realized what was at stake: data. At a conference in Berlin in 2015, Audi CEO Rupert Stadler said car owners "want to be in control of their data, and not subject to monitoring." A few months earlier, Stadler stated that "the data that we collect is our data and not Google's.

Audi reveals 'rightsized' 2.0 TFSI engine for next A4

Downsizing engines is a trend sweeping the industry. It's not a new thing, and downsizing helps automakers cut fuel consumption and emissions while employing techniques like turbocharging and direct injection. Audi, however, is taking a different approach with its latest engine. Revealed at the Vienna Motor Symposium in Austria is Audi's newest trick powertrain. Where others are going with smaller engines, Ingolstadt's latest displaces a nice round 2.0 liters, employing a shorter intake time to use less fuel. It's sort of like the Miller cycle that Mazda brought to market on the old Millenia, only turbocharged (instead of supercharged) and brought up to date. Audi calls the four-pot "rightsized," producing 190 horsepower and 236 pound-feet of torque across a broad rev range, while getting 47 miles to the gallon – and that's on the US cycle, which is tougher than the European standard a company like Audi would usually quote. In short, it's designed to provide power where needed but only sip at the fuel tank when it's not, but the geekiest among us will want to delve into all the intricacies outlined in the announcement below. The engine is set to power the next-generation A4 before being rolled out in additional models in the future. Ingolstadt/Vienna, 2015-05-07 World premiere at the Vienna Motor Symposium: new high-efficiency engine from Audi - New 2.0 TFSI four-cylinder engine with innovative combustion method - Top figures: 190 hp, 320 Nm (236.0 lb-ft), less than 5 l/100 km (47.0 US mpg) - To be implemented in the new Audi A4 by the end of 2015 - Prof. Dr. Ulrich Hackenberg: "A prime example of the Audi rightsizing strategy" Audi presents the most efficient two-liter gasoline engine in its class. The new 2.0 TFSI with 140 kW (190 hp) demonstrates the engine expertise of the brand – with a ground-breaking new combustion method. Audi will be using the engine for the first time in the next generation of the A4. Over ten years ago, Audi was the first manufacturer worldwide to bring the TFSI engine with turbocharging and direct injection into series production. This made the brand with the four rings the trendsetter in downsizing and downspeeding. "We're now taking a crucial step further with rightsizing," said Prof. Dr. Ulrich Hackenberg, Member of the Board of Management for Technical Development at AUDI AG.