The International Car of the Year Awards
How Cars Reflect Our Lifestyle

Presented during private ceremonies around the country, the ICOTY Awards honor 10 vehicles each year for the most superlative connection between cars and consumers. Nominees include vehicles that are manufactured by American, British, German, Japanese, Korean and Swedish automakers but are sold in the United States.

Launched in 1997 at the North American International Auto Show, the ICOTY Awards became the first automotive awards show to honor new vehicles based on the emotional connection between car and consumer. Today, the ICOTY Awards have evolved and honor vehicles based on lifestyle compatibility and how well automakers achieve that goal.

"The ICOTY Awards are not about power and performance, but rather about personality and passion," said ICOTY Executive Producer Courtney Caldwell. Bridgestone, longtime lead sponsor of the ICOTY Awards, recognizes the consumer-product relationship as critical to vehicle success.

“Bridgestone is proud to support the ICOTY awards, and applauds the efforts of these automakers that like our company demonstrate a strong commitment to innovative technology,” said Michael Martini, president, Consumer OE, Bridgestone Americas. “Through the combined efforts of everyone in the auto industry, and led by automakers like those being recognized today, we will continue to meet and exceed the demands of the motoring public.”

Below are the vehicles that were deemed best in class relative to consumer lifestyle and how well each automaker connected with consumers.

And the Winners are:

Presented in Detroit - Press Release

2011 International Car of the Year
Hyundai Sonata

2011 International Truck of the Year
Kia Sportage
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Presented in New York - Press Release

2011 International Luxury Car of the Year
Jaguar XJ - Most Respected

2011 International Sedan of the Year
Volvo S60 - Most Dependable

2011 International SUV of the Year
Ford Explorer - Most Resourceful

In order to achieve a balanced perspective that reflects all consumers, ICOTY engages a diverse group of renowned automotive journalists and editors in the voting process. The ICOTY Jury consists of 12 reputable writers and editors who represent respected publications such as Road & Travel Magazine, Consumer Guide Automotive, Car and Driver Online, Auto Week, MSN Autos, and Cars.com, to name a few. Voting ballots are then sent to J.D. Power and Associates for final tabulation to ensure accuracy and credibility.

For its first 13 years, ICOTY was the largest, most professionally produced auto awards show in the auto industry, an event which had been coined by industry leaders as the Academy Awards of Cars. Today, the ICOTY Awards are presented in private ceremonies over the course of four months during the period of new model introductions, which provides more opportunity for all automakers to compete for the awards in the new model year. This also gives ICOTY jury members, who are spread out across North America, several opportunities to co-present the awards to winning automakers.

The criteria on which votes are cast can be found in the ICOTY AWARDS archive section under 'Awards Criteria.' Each vehicle must be of in-production models of the new year.

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