2000 Hyundai Elantra on 2040-cars

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Hyundai Santa Cruz could get green light this year

The market for smaller trucks is gaining steam in the United States with introductions like the Chevrolet Colorado, GMC Canyon, and the forthcoming, updated Toyota Tacoma. After the enthusiastic reaction to the Hyundai HCD-15 Santa Cruz concept at 2015 Detroit Auto Show, that pickup is looking increasingly likely to see production, as well. "There is a very high probability we get the approval of the truck soon," Hyundai Motor America CEO Dave Zuchowski said to the TheDetroitBureau.com. Customer surveys have shown the possible pickup to be quite popular around the country, except among Texans, according to Zuchowski. However, the final sign-off still needs to come from corporate headquarters in South Korea. The production Santa Cruz might be very different from the vehicle on the stand in Detroit. The concept was just there to gauge reactions, and the company hadn't even decided on a platform at that time. The slide-out bed extension was thought to be possible in the real world, but there were reportedly still other hurdles to overcome. The unibody pickup isn't the only project Hyundai is developing for North America. The automaker also wants to step into the expanding compact crossover market with an entry specifically designed for this market. "This is a growth segment," Zuchowski told TheDetroitBureau.com. "We want a piece of it." While neither of these new models are fully approved yet, it certainly looks like Hyundai intends to be a bigger player in the truck and crossover world in the coming years. Related Video:

Dodge, Hyundai crowdsourced-funding sites deemed successes

What's not to love about crowdsourcing? This idea, after all, has given us Kickstarter as well Local Motors, but automakers are starting to use the social platform to sell more cars (or just drum up a little PR). Both Dodge and Hyundai have used "crowd-funding" recently, and while Automotive News is reporting that neither has racked up big sales with this gimmick, both automakers are pleased with the attention.
For Hyundai, it teamed up with website Motozuma.com to help customers crowdsource money for a down payment, and the automaker matched this amount up to $500. Last year, this helped Hyundai sell an extra 1,600 units, a fraction of its total 2012 sales. That figure is far larger than Dodge fared with the Dodge Dart Registry - it netted only two sales and a small number of individual options. This registry did help University of Southern California fraternity crowdsource $18,000 to buy a Dart for a local Meals on Wheels, however. Despite the low sales figures, Dodge and Hyundai are considering their crowdsourcing programs a success since it helped them connect with younger buyers.

YouTube tallies votes for this year's top five Super Bowl spots [w/video]

When we asked you to tell us which of this year's 16 car-themed Super Bowl commercials you liked best, you chose the Farmer commercial from Chrysler Group, advertising the Ram trucks, over Audi's Prom commercial in second place. Turns out the voters in YouTube's Ad Blitz poll agreed, voting the same commercial to the number one spot from among the field commercials in every category.
From there, however, they went in a totally different direction. Budweiser's The Clydesdales spot came second, Samsung's The Next Big Thing took third. The Jeep Whole Again ad scored fourth in the YouTube poll, fifth in our poll of auto commercials, and the Hyundai Team spot got fifth from the YouTubers, but ninth in our poll.
The voting results don't match up with the viewing numbers, though - while Farmer has more than 13 million views, The Next Big Thing is well beyond 21 million. You can read the press release below and see all five spots, lined up for you, one more time.