2014 Hyundai Sonata Gls on 2040-cars

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Hyundai Santa Fe shows its face on mountain roads

The last time we saw the new Hyundai Santa Fe crossover, it was pretty well covered, and it happened to be hustling around the Nurburgring with at least one racing seat. This time, one of our spy photographers caught it being tested on public roads. It also has a nearly uncovered front end, save for the black and white vinyl wrap. It appears the racing seats are gone, too. Aside from the seats, we can see very clearly that the Santa Fe will wear a version of the new corporate grille introduced on the new Sonata. In contrast to the Sonata, the outer corners are higher and sharper, and the base of the grille appears to narrow much more dramatically. It's also undeniable now that the Santa Fe will have a headlight setup just like that of its tiny Kona cousin, in which the lower lamps are actually the primary lights, and the scowling upper lamps are just accents. Unlike the Kona, the extra slit above the main grille is absent. The rest of the crossover is still well-covered, so there aren't any other revelations. We still expect to see this new Santa Fe to make its debut sometime next year, possibly in the spring or fall, as a 2019 model. Related Video: Featured Gallery 2019 Hyundai Santa Fe spy shots View 13 Photos Image Credit: CarPix Spy Photos Hyundai Crossover Economy Cars hyundai santa fe

How Hyundai lost momentum, and will 'take a few years' to recover

SEOUL/DETROIT/CHONGQING, China — At a near-empty Hyundai Motor showroom in the Chinese mega city of Chongqing, the store manager is grumbling about his shortage of customers and a lack of bigger, cheaper SUV models popular in the world's largest auto market. Even with discounting of as much as 25 percent, his dealership was selling barely a hundred vehicles a month, said the manager surnamed Li. A nearby Nissan dealership was selling about 400 vehicles a month, a store manager there said. "The sales are simply poor," Li told Reuters. "Look at the Nissan store next door, they have tens of customers while we just have two." An hour's drive away is Hyundai's massive $1 billion manufacturing plant, which opened last year with a target to produce 300,000 vehicles per year. But with sales weak and the Chinese auto market slowing sharply, the factory is running at roughly 30 percent of capacity, two people with knowledge of the matter said. The sources asked not to be identified because the information was not public. Hyundai, the world's fifth largest automaker, declined to comment on the Chongqing plant's production or the showroom's sales but said it is "closely cooperating" with local partner BAIC to turn around the China business. BAIC did not respond to requests for comment. Hyundai's woes mark a major reversal for the automaker which was an early success story in China as it quickly and cheaply rolled out popular new models into a surging market. In 2009, Hyundai and partner Kia's combined sales ranked third in China after General Motors and Volkswagen. The South Korean duo now ranks ninth, and its market share in China was 4 percent last year, from more than10 percent at the beginning of this decade. Executives and industry experts say Hyundai conceded its once stronghold in the low-end segment to fast-growing Chinese rivals such as Geely and BYD. Foreign rivals not only defended their turf in premium segments but also kept pricing competitive for mass-market models, squeezing Hyundai's positioning as an affordable foreign brand, they said. In the United States, the world's second-biggest auto market, Hyundai's market share fell to 4 percent last year, near a decade low. Hyundai ran into problems in China and the United States for similar reasons: It missed shifts in consumer tastes, especially the surge in demand for SUVs, and it sought higher prices than its brand image could command, four Chinese dealers and half a dozen former and current U.S.

Hyundai in trouble for overstating fuel economy numbers at home, too

Hyundai is, understandably, "very confused by the fine and the different results."
The South Korean government is investigating Hyundai and Ssangyong, alleging that the two manufacturers overstated the fuel economy figures on some of their crossovers. But while the initial investigation is being carried out by the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, a separate branch of government, the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy is supporting the manufacturers' estimates. See Americans, our government isn't the only dysfunctional one.