Genesis Coupe not for Oz… yet

Hyundai is gearing up to launch its all-new premium global premium brand Genesis in Australia from 2017, but its local expansion will be slow and steady.

The point of difference for the new brand is expected to be value for money, with pricing expected to be significantly lower than like-for-like rivals from European brands.

Headed by several well-respected executives poached from some of Europe's best-known premium car brands, such as Bentley, BMW and Lamborghini, the Genesis brand wants to take on the likes of Mercedes-Benz, Audi and Lexus.

As such it will focus on major luxury markets such as North America and Europe, which will mean right-hand drive markets like Australia and the UK miss out on some models.

Thus far, Genesis has confirmed it'll launch six new models by 2020:

Genesis G70 sedan
Genesis G70 coupe
Genesis G80 sedan
Genesis G90 sedan
Genesis small SUV
Genesis large SUV

Public Relations General Manager at Hyundai Australia, Bill Thomas, told motoring.com.au "Not all six vehicles are confirmed for Australia.

"It's down to which vehicles are manufactured in right-hand drive. It's a business decision based on volume that will be the ultimate decider."

Genesis already has partial presence in Australia in the form of the slow-selling Hyundai Genesis large sedan, which is sold in Hyundai dealerships. This vehicle will be given a facelift in 2017 and rebadged as the G80.

"G80 will launch the Genesis brand in Australia," said Thomas, "We will move to a full Genesis branding for the range. It's going to be fantastic."

The G80 will then be followed by the launch of the mid-size G70 sedan – a direct rival for the BMW 3 Series sedan -- towards the end of 2017.

"The G70 four-door vehicle is confirmed for right-hand drive, and we'll get that in Australia next year too," said Thomas.

"It's more of a [BMW] 4 Series Gran Coupe rival," he said of the G70. "That stance [seen in the Genesis New York Concept that previewed it] won't change much.

Both the G80 and G70 are likely to come with Hyundai's new 3.3-litre twin-turbo V6, which former BMW M division chief Albert Biermann – who now heads Hyundai's performance car brand, N – has previously indicated has more potential than its current 270kW/510Nm outputs.

"Rear-drive with a 3.3-litre twin-turbo petrol engine? That'd be some car," said Thomas.

However, Australians won't have access to the big Genesis G90 limousine, and Thomas said it was too early to talk about local availability of a two-door coupe version of the G70.

"That vehicle is not confirmed for Australia," he stated.

The G70 Coupe is likely to closely resemble the G70 sedan, although Hyundai has previous shown a number of two-door concepts that were believed to preview it, the most recent being the 2015 Vision G Coupe (pictured).

A G70 Coupe powered by a 300kW-plus biturbo V6 would be a direct rival for BMW's M4 and the Mercedes-AMG C 63 Coupe.

That leaves perhaps the two most important models that Genesis will launch this decade, the SUVs. In terms of sales potential and branding, they will be the vehicles that put Genesis on the map, but Thomas insisted few details were known about the vehicles.

"What does Genesis want to achieve as a luxury challenger brand? That will dictate what sort of vehicles we bring to market," he said, hinting that the smaller of the two SUVs was most likely to be offered here.

The two SUVs are expected to include a small/medium sized vehicle based on the G70 platform, whose right-hand drive platform would make it a shoe-in for Australia, rivalling top-selling primo SUVs such as the BMW X3 and Mercedes-Benz GLC, plus a larger SUV based on the G80 sedan.

The final piece of the Genesis puzzle could appear next decade in the form of supercar, which will ram home Hyundai's serious intent with the Genesis brand.

Genesis vehicles will be sold from inside Hyundai dealerships to begin with – a showroom within a showroom. And the initial plan to offer the vehicles across a wide number of sites has been scaled back.

"The number of them will be brought down – we will focus on the showrooms with proven results that are in the right location," said Thomas, who wouldn't be drawn on how Genesis will marketed in Australia.

"The strength of the brand will be clear when more models are shown," he said.