It does realease the hatch. When actuated the solenoid pulls the cable witch pulls on the latch arm in the rear gate's lock mechanism. This is only a momentary actuation... which is why you need a door popper to push the gate out as soon as the latch is pulled. Otherwise, the latch is released and then latched again before you have a chance to pull the gate open.

If you do a search online for universal trunk release kits you will find many kits like the one above, but you won't get all of the extras Tone has included in his... along with his VX specific instruction.