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Hyundai planning N-badged Genesis performance models

Speaking with Australian media ahead of the launch of the new Genesis G90 at the Detroit Auto Show this week, Albert Biermann, performance chief at Hyundai, confirmed that there will be N-badged versions of both Hyundai and Genesis models. And he ought to know. Biermann was recently poached over to South Korea after having served as chief engineer at BMW's M division. "N is a sub-brand and with N high-performance cars we work for both brands — so you have to be ready for N versions for Hyundai and for Genesis," said Biermann. "We have a nice roadmap for the next five years... There will be Genesis cars included" that will offer "the full package... real racetrack-going high-performance cars." The first model that the N division is expected to fettle is the next-generation i30 hatchback – Hyundai's challenger to the likes of the Ford Focus and Volkswagen Golf. That ought to give the Korean automaker a solid rival to the Focus ST and Golf GTI, and a venue for Hyundai to showcase everything it's learned in the World Rally Championship. But that's not all Biermann and company have in store. Hyundai is working on a new Genesis G70 that will take on the BMW 3 Series and its many competitors. The G70 would make a prime candidate for the N treatment, and with the benefit of Biermann's expertise, it could prove the sweet-handling and hot-performing Korean sports sedan we've been waiting for. We wouldn't at all be surprised, either, to see N performance versions of the new G90, the G80 that was launched just recently as the Hyundai Genesis sedan, and other future products under both brands – particularly a successor to the Genesis Coupe. Related Video:

Hyundai, Kia and U of M studying 'highway hypnosis'

Next up on the hot-button list of things that can kill you behind the wheel: "highway hypnosis." That's the zombie-like, autopilot phase you get into on a long highway drive when there isn't much to distract you, like curves or traffic. Digging further into what it is and how to combat it, Hyundai-Kia engineers and the University of Michigan are commencing a study that will measure brainwave activity in order to track the body's slide into highway hypnosis.
We're not sure how much overlap this has with Mercedes-Benz's Attention Assist, which tracks more than 70 in-car parameters to determine when you're not focused on the road anymore. That system is billed as an alarm against fatigue, in our experience it does more than that - if you use your phone while driving, for instance, it will chirp.
They don't know what form a warning system will take yet, but Hyundai-Kia plans to develop a method for warning drivers when they being to zone out. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, there were more than three thousand deaths and nearly 400,000 injuries due to distracted driving in 2011.

How the Blue Link Apple Watch app talks to Hyundai Sonata PHEV

Getting all of our electronic gadgets to talk to each other is the technologist utopia normally called the Internet of Things. Cars are no strangers to this new Internet and that means that your smartphone is getting more and more chatty with any number of vehicles, especially plug-in vehicles. The new 2016 Hyundai Sonata Plug-In Hybrid is the latest that can communicate with your phone, and it also has a new-found ability to talk to smart watches. We talked with Hyundai's manager of connected care publicity, Miles Johnson, about the new features in the Apple Watch app during out recent test drive of the Sonata PHEV. To be honest, there's nothing groundbreaking in the new Blue Link Apple Watch app except that it works on your wrist instead of your palm – you can see the state of charge and be guided to your car in a crowded parking lot – but we're still in favor of anything that makes electric vehicles seem one step ahead of your non-connected ride. You can get an up-close and personal look at the new app's capabilities in the video above and read our first drive of the PHEV and the standard hybrid here.