Acura (Japanese: アキュラ, Akyura) is the luxury vehicle brand of Japanese automaker Honda Motor Company. It primarily competes with Lexus, Infiniti and Cadillac among others as a certified luxury vehicle. It has been used in the US, Canada and Hong Kong since March 1986 to market Honda's performance automobiles and near-performance vehicles. The brand was introduced to Mexico in 2004 and to the Chinese market in 2006. The Acura brand will be introduced in Russia at the end of 2008. Honda plans to introduce Acura to the Japanese domestic market two years from 2008 or so. 2007 Mid-Year CEO Speech (Japanese) Establishing A Sales Channel from the Customer Viewpoint, 2. Accelerating our effort in Japan to strengthen the core characteristics that make Honda unique, Summary of 2007 Mid-Year CEO Speech (English) ホンダ、高級車アキュラの国内発売延期 (Japanese) With the Acura brand, Honda is credited with being the first to tap into a market for luxury Japanese cars outside Japan. Before Acura, automobiles exported from Japan were primarily economical in design and largely targeted at low-cost consumers.