World automakers do not rank among big league players until they sell their cars in the U.S., the world's richest auto showroom. Last week South Korea announced its bid for a place in that market. Executives of Hyundai Motor America, a subsidiary of South Korea's largest industrial conglomerate (est. 1984 sales: $10.3 billion), said that they will begin selling cars in the U.S. this fall.
Hyundai is nothing if not ambitious. Max Jamiesson, 51, a former Toyota official who is the new executive vice president of Hyundai Motor America, told participants at the convention of the National Automobile Dealers Assoc. in...