Porsche, Lexus, Hyundai top US quality survey

Detroit, June 8: Porsche AG shot to the top of the list in an influential survey of the quality of new cars released on Wednesday, while Toyota Motor Corp. and its luxury Lexus brand dominated individual model rankings.

Hyundai Motor Co., meanwhile, rose from No. 11 in last year's J.D. Power and Associates Initial Quality Study to become the top-ranked mass-market auto brand in the U.S.market.

Porsche had been No. 32 in 2005, far below the industry average. The luxury car maker gained sharply in 2006 on a strong showing for its Cayman sports car, which launched in January, and improvements in the quality rating of its Cayenne sport utility vehicle.

Toyota, long seen as the gold-standard in quality, took 11 of 19 awards for top-ranked vehicles in 2006 together with its Lexus brand, which ranked No. 2 overall.

''They definitely are still on the throne,'' said Joe Ivers, executive director of research for J.D. Power.

Hyundai's rise in the rankings came even as the Korean automaker began production of a revamped Sonata sedan at a new plant in Montgomery, Alabama. Vehicle launches and new plants typically hurt quality ratings for major automakers as they scramble to fix early product and production glitches.

The Toyota brand ranked No. 4 overall, behind Hyundai and just ahead of Ford Motor Co.'s Jaguar, Honda Motor Co. and General Motors Corp.'s Cadillac brand.

Quality rankings are closely watched because of their influence in consumer purchasing decisions and resale values.

They are also a proxy for the warranty costs automakers face.

U.S. automakers, who have argued perception of their quality problems has lagged real improvements, had a mixed report card.

For General Motors Corp., both Cadillac and GMC made the top 10 brands. GMC also swept the honors in the large pickup truck category. But GM's Saturn, Pontiac, Buick, Saab and Hummer brands all ranked below the industry average.

Two Ford brands -- Jaguar and Lincoln -- beat that average, but the Mercury and Ford names fell short. Ford's Land Rover ranked as the worst brand in the industry with more than twice as many reported problems as Hyundai.

J.D. Power based its study on responses from 63,607 people who bought 2006 model cars and trucks. They were surveyed after 90 days of ownership about both defects and design problems.

ASIAN RIVALS? A Toyota executive said that while the company still had an industry-leading low defect rate, owners had flagged difficulties using features such as navigation systems and clocks.

Still, he said Toyota had a deep reservoir of brand loyalty with less than 2 percent of its potential car buyers also considering a vehicle made by Hyundai, a company many see as Toyota's biggest long-term rival.

''There is no question that Hyundai is coming on strong and doing a good job in both design and reducing defects,'' said Toyota group Vice President Jim Lentz.

Hyundai, which has seen sales rise almost 4 percent to date in 2006, will use the J.D. Power results in its own marketing efforts, representatives said.

Dogged by quality problems in the 1980s, Hyundai currently offers an industry-leading 100,000-mile warranty as part of its campaign to reassure a new generation of U.S. car buyers.

''Hopefully we're erasing any doubts in our customers' minds,'' Don Dees, Hyundai Motor America vice president of service, told Reuters. ''Obviously we've got to get the message out there.'' Porsche, meanwhile, set itself apart with simpler design for U.S. consumers, Ivers of J.D. Power said.

While other German automakers score well in terms of limited numbers of defects, German brands tend to lag when it comes to aspects of design like ergonomics and ease of use for controls.

BMW AG, for instance, is ranked alongside Toyota on the basis of its limited defects, but ''approaches controls and displays in a way that creates some problems,'' he said.

On an overall basis, BMW ranked 28th in the J.D. Power study, behind DaimlerChrysler AG's Mercedes-Benz brand, which came in at 26.

Although the basis of that 2006 ranking was not immediately clear, BMW has faced harsh criticism in recent years for its use of a complicated screen interface on its 7 Series sedan to control simple functions like air conditioning.

''Porsche doesn't have any of those problems,'' Ivers said.

''Their customers can just get in the car and focus on driving.''

Reuters