Dodge’s smallest car was a renamed Hyundai

We recently reported on a rumor that Hyundai might be working with General Motors to launch a new GM truck with the H badge. Hyundai sold a respectable 36,675 Santa Cruz units in 2023, so they know how to build a solid compact truck but have never explored the full-size pickup truck market. At the moment this is just a rumor, but it could be exciting to see what Hyundai can do on a GM ladder frame platform.

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  Hyundai

  Hyundai Motor Company was founded by Chung Ju-yung in 1967, 20 years after the birth of Hyundai Engineering and Construction Company. The automobile brand’s first model was the Cortina, which was launched in 1968 with the help of Ford, while the first self-developed car was launched a year later as the Pony. Since then, the company has been successful with affordable cars and has always been known for its reliability and value. Today, ventures range from combustion, hybrid, all-electric and hydrogen mobility solutions to robotics.

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  Evade

  Like many automakers, Dodge grew from a machine shop that supplied parts and assemblies to a full-fledged automaker in the early 1900s. The Dodge brothers began building cars in 1914 under the “Dodge Brothers” brand. The company was sold to Chrysler in 1928 and originally produced trucks, large passenger cars and compact cars. Nowadays, the brand is known for high-performance cars such as the legendary Charger and Challenger, sold under the Stellantis banner.

However, this is far from the Korean brand’s first rodeo when it comes to renaming, and we’re not just talking about the three-part Kia/Genesis/Hyundai combination here. In fact, this wouldn’t even be Hyundai’s first partnership with an American truck maker, as the brand has a long history with Dodge and the American brand is lending its name to a pair of Hyundais for launch in Latin America. We’re talking about the Hyundai Getz and the Hyundai Accent, or as our friends down south would call them, the Dodge Brisa and the Dodge Verna.

The Hyundai Getz or the second generation Dodge Brisa

In case you’re wondering what a Hyundai Getz is, we never got one in the US. This is a subcompact hatchback model that was released in 2002 and is known by several names. South Korea got the Hyundai Click, Japan got the Hyundai TB, Australia and New Zealand got the Blade Electron, and Venezuela got the Dodge Brisa.

If a Dodge-branded Hyundai isn’t confusing enough, the car was actually manufactured by MMC Automotriz SA, a brand now primarily known for making Mitsubishis but once serving as Hyundai’s main manufacturer in the region. And here’s something else to muddy the waters: the Brisa actually started life as a Hyundai Accent in its first generation. MMC Automotriz SA only began developing the Getz logo for the second generation of the Brisa in 2006.

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The reason for the change: The Accent-based Brisa wasn’t selling that well, so they decided to drop the car but keep the nameplate. The second generation Brisa ran from 2006 to 2009 and was equipped with the Getz’s 81 hp 1.3 liter Alpha engine. The Getz itself only lasted a single generation and became Hyundai’s best-selling vehicle in Europe from 2003 to 2008. In 2004 alone, 123,701 units were sold.

The Hyundai Accent or Dodge Verna

The Verna name harkens back to the first generation Hyundai Accent when the car was sold as the Hyundai Accent Verna in some markets. The second generation, released in 1999 for the 2000 model year, was to be sold in Mexico as the Dodge Verna. Available information about what configurations were available in Mexico is limited, but we’ve seen parts listings for a 1.6-liter 2004 model, so we can at least verify the existence of the top-of-the-line Verna.

The second-generation Accent was also renamed the “Glad Accent” in Sudan, the “Hyundai Brio” in Puerto Rico, and, our favorite, the “Hyundai Super Pony,” a nameplate used specifically for the taxi market.

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Hyundai launched a third-generation Accent in 2005, but the second-generation model continued to be sold in Egypt until 2019 (where it was sold alongside the third-generation models), in Russia and Indonesia until 2012, and in India until 2016 . The Dodge Verna lasted in Mexico until at least the 2006 model year.

Let’s not forget the Hyundai Equus or Mitsubishi Proudia

Mitsubishi launched the Proudia or Dignity in 1999 and worked in collaboration with Hyundai from the start. As part of the deal, Hyundai secured the rights to produce its own version of the car, the Hyundai Equus, from 1999 to 2009. Unfortunately, the Proudia/Dignity wasn’t a bestseller and only sold a meager 1,227 units over its three-year run. The Equus, on the other hand, enjoyed some success, particularly in South Korea, resulting in a popular sedan model and a second-generation model for the 2010 to 2016 model years.

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This was not the first collaboration between these two Asian automakers. Hyundai loaned an Excel to Mitsubishi, which sold it in the US as the Precis, to circumvent the voluntary import quota that affected the Mitsubishi Mirage, on which the Excel itself was based. International readers may know Hyundai by the name Bimantara, which is used for the Accent and the Elantra for the Indonesian market. Malaysians may have driven the Inokom Atos, known as the Dodge Atos in Mexico, or the Kia Visto in South Korea.

The list really goes on and raises a question:

What’s actually going on with all this international rebadging?

There are many reasons to design a vehicle for the international market with a badge. One of the most common motivations is that it is a cost-effective way to expand your market presence in a specific region. If your latest model sells like hotcakes in Mexico, you can either invest in designing and manufacturing a completely new car or borrow a model from one of your partners and grow your brand without doubling your budget. When Volkswagen wanted to enter the (then hot) North American minivan market in the early 2000s, it borrowed the Dodge Grand Caravan and sold it as the VW Routan, a sporty, upscale alternative to the Chrysler model.

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Another motive would be the example we gave of the Mitsubishi Precis, where Mitsubishi borrowed the Hyundai Excel to avoid trade tariffs and sell a Korean-made car with Japanese DNA to America. And sometimes it’s just good marketing. Check out the RAM 1200, a unibody pickup marketed for fleet work in Mexico. It’s actually a renamed Fiat Titano, but doesn’t the RAM 1200 sound like a much tougher work truck?

Sources:
Automotriz, Hyundai .