Hyundai Motor Group said Wednesday it has sold its Chongqing plant in China to the region’s industrial park developer Yufu Industrial Complex Construction Co. for approximately 1.62 billion yuan ($290 million), as part of a global operational restructuring aimed at shifting focus from volatile markets to expanding in growing Asian countries like India and Indonesia. The sale comes in the wake of the company's dwindling market share in China, which fell to 1.4 percent in 2023. This dec

Samsung SDI, a leading South Korean lithium-ion battery manufacturer, has acquired a stake in Toronto-based Canada Nickel in a $18.5 million deal to ensure a stable supply of critical battery materials for its expanding North American operations. Announced on the Toronto Stock Exchange on Monday, Samsung SDI will acquire an 8.7 percent stake in the major Canadian nickel mining company. This stake translates into 15.6 million shares. Under the agreement, Samsung SDI not only secures an initial pu

Hyundai Motor Group plans to invest an additional 70 billion rupees ($845 million) into an automotive plant owned by General Motors in Talegaon, India, according to Indian authorities on Tuesday. According to an online post on X, formerly Twitter, uploaded by Devendra Fadnavis, deputy chief minister of the western state of Maharashtra, the Korean auto giant plans to sign a memorandum of understanding for the new funding during this week’s World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Fadnavi

Heavier weight and faster acceleration mean EVs get through tires more quickly – posing challenges and opportunities for tiremakers

CALIFORNIA CITY, California -- If you want to know how Kia's Telluride SUV managed to rank among the top midsize sporty utility vehicles in the US market last year, or how Hyundai and Kia clinched second place in the US EV market behind Tesla following a record sales year, it’s worth taking a closer look at their California Proving Ground, the Korean carmakers’ extensive vehicle testing facility in the Mojave Desert. “Our focus has evolved from primarily testing internal c

Hyundai Motor Group steps into the virtual space with its latest launch, Hyundai Future Adventure, on Roblox. Unveiled Monday, the game aims to captivate younger audiences by presenting Hyundai's mobility technologies in Roblox, the popular virtual gaming platform frequented by Generation Alpha and Generation Z. In the image is a Hyundai Roblox avatar in the center flanked by Boston Dynamics' robots Spot and Atlas on the right, with DAL-e, the service robot, on the left, as Hyundai

SK Ecoplant, the construction arm of South Korea’s second-largest conglomerate SK Group, said Monday it will boost business ties with the US state of Nevada on electric vehicles and electronic waste recycling. SK Ecoplant CEO Park Kyung-il met with Governor of Nevada Joe Lombardo on Sunday at the company’s recycling subsidiary TES in Las Vegas. The two leaders looked around the e-waste recycling plant and discussed TES’ e-waste business, battery recycling technology and global

Samsung SDI has outpaced its Korean rivals by supplying batteries to the largest number of electric vehicles under the heightened US EV tax credit regulations that went into effect Jan. 1, according to industry sources on Sunday. Of the 19 EVs eligible for the new incentive rules this year under the Inflation Reduction Act, 15 car models will use Korea-made batteries, while China’s CATL and AESC Group, which made the cut last year, have been removed from the list. Samsung SDI topped the li

Renault Brand CEO Fabrice Cambolive looks around the production lines of the French carmaker’s Busan plant last week. Cambolive was visiting Korea to inspect local operations, especially the development work of the “Aurora 1” project, the carmaker’s new hybrid sport utility vehicle. “Renault is preparing for a new phase in the Korean market this year. … (The Aurora 1) will certainly be a vehicle that meets the high expectations of Korean and international con

LG Electronics Inc. said Saturday that it has opened its first plant in the US for electric vehicle charging stations, as part of its strategy to advance into the fast-growing EV charging solutions business. The factory based in Fort Worth, Texas, has an annual capacity of over 10,000 units, according to LG Electronics. LG said earlier its 11 kilowatt wall-mounted and stand-type slow chargers, and 175 kW fast-charging models will be available in the US market in the first half of 2024. The compa

Hyundai Motor Group, following a record-breaking year with US sales surpassing 1.6 million Hyundai and Kia vehicles, is setting their sights high in the US this year to reach a cumulative sale of 1 million eco-friendly vehicles since 2011 and 300,000 luxury Genesis cars, leveraging their strong sales momentum and expanding their eco-friendly and high-end vehicle lineups. Last year, Hyundai and Kia sold a combined 1.6 million vehicles in the US, an increase of 12 percent from 2021 and the highest

LAS VEGAS/SEOUL -- Chey Jae-won, executive vice chairman of SK Group and SK On CEO, on Wednesday vowed to accelerate plans for the battery maker's market debut at the CES 2024 tech show being held in Las Vegas this week. “It’s hard to predict (the exact timeline for the initial public offering) because we have to consider market conditions and prepare (for the IPO process),” said Chey to the press. “But we’ll push forward (the schedule) as soon as possible when

Korean carmaker looks to expand purpose-built vehicle biz with global car-sharing service provider

42dot, the software mobility unit under Hyundai Motor Group, clinched a deal with Samsung Electronics to develop an artificial intelligence-based software-defined vehicle platform on the sidelines of the CES 2024 tech show in Las Vegas on Tuesday. Song Chang-hyeon, who doubles as 42dot CEO and president of the software-defined vehicle unit at Hyundai Motor Group, and Park Yong-in, president of the system large-scale integration division at Samsung Electronics, participated in a signing ceremony

Hyundai Mobis, a car parts manufacturing unit under Hyundai Motor Group, unveiled Mobion, an electric vehicle running on its self-driving e-Corner System technology for the first time at CES 2024 in Las Vegas on Wednesday. The technology incorporates the world’s first in-wheel motors consisting of four small motors that incorporate rotational steering and electronic braking in one module installed in the car wheels. “The e-Corner system reduces physical connections of mechanical devi