Kia Performance Chief Says Brand Is More Focused On Engineering Than His Last Employer, BMW M

Good things come to those who wait, and if you’ve been patiently waiting for Kia to launch its Optima GT – first unveiled at the Frankfurt motor show in 2015 – then you’ll be getting a much better car than it might otherwise have been.

At an event at Kia and Hyundai’s new test track facilities at Namyang in Korea, head of vehicle testing and high performance development Albert Biermann told evo that his team had basically had to redevelop the Optima GT from scratch, after driving an early prototype.

MDarringer - 8/1/2016 10:05:51 PM

-1 Boost

Given how "Camry" BMW tuning has gotten, I agree.

The suck boys of the Fourth Reich will disagree of course.

HughJass - 8/2/2016 3:07:45 PM

+2 Boost

How do you expect him to earn his overinflated paycheck if he doesn't trash talk the Germans? Ironic since the Koreans secretly wish they were judging by their car ads.

Yeah, undersized tires with spaghetti suspension makes for a great peformance car. After all, you just have to stick a letter after the name like N (i.e. BMW M) to make your product a performance contender.

MDarringer - 8/2/2016 7:15:04 PM

0 Boost

@HughJass To quote myself: "...when people badmouth me I look at it like I won and all they can do is b!+ch..." You cannot even comprehend how you got played.

carloslassiter - 8/2/2016 5:10:10 PM

+1 Boost

He seems like an unbiased, totally neutral source of information.

MDarringer - 8/2/2016 7:15:30 PM

+1 Boost

O Carlosito, no mames guey