Hyundai Motor Group and Seoul City Sign Agreement to Jointly Host the '2021 Autonomous Driving Challenge'

[Asia Economy Reporter Changhwan Lee] Hyundai Motor Group will jointly host an autonomous vehicle competition with the Seoul Metropolitan Government.

On the 28th, Hyundai Motor Group announced that it signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) for the joint hosting of the ‘2021 Autonomous Driving Challenge’ at the Seosomun Government Complex in Seoul, attended by Dongil Park, Vice President in charge of R&D Planning and Coordination at Hyundai Motor Group, and Hwang Boyeon, Director of Urban Transportation at the Seoul Metropolitan Government, among other officials.

The ‘2021 Autonomous Driving Challenge’ is the new name for Hyundai Motor Group’s ‘University Student Autonomous Vehicle Competition,’ which has been held since 2010, where university students build autonomous vehicles themselves to compete in technological capabilities.

Starting this year, Hyundai Motor Group and the Seoul Metropolitan Government will jointly host the event as a collaboration between a corporation and a local government to further expand the base of autonomous vehicle research and strengthen the nurturing of future automotive talent.

The ‘2021 Autonomous Driving Challenge’ will be operated in two stages: a preliminary round evaluating autonomous driving algorithms in a virtual environment, and a final round assessing comprehensive autonomous driving performance with actual vehicles. The event will be held in the world’s first 5G-converged autonomous vehicle pilot zone.

Established in August 2019 by the Seoul Metropolitan Government and the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, the Sangam Autonomous Vehicle Pilot Zone includes major roads in Sangam such as Susaek-ro and Seongam-ro (total length 22 km), equipped with world-class infrastructure necessary for autonomous driving demonstrations, including an ultra-low latency traffic signal open system capable of real-time traffic environment control, roads, and 5G communication infrastructure, enabling safe testing of autonomous driving technology on actual roads.

For this competition, 23 participating teams from 18 universities nationwide, pre-selected through document and presentation evaluations, have begun developing autonomous driving algorithms using virtual software provided by Hyundai Motor Group since last year, and will hold preliminary rounds on February 18 and 19.

The preliminary rounds will be conducted non-face-to-face, and the top six teams advancing to the finals will receive one Niro EV each and production support funds of 50 million KRW.

The final round, held this October at the Sangam Autonomous Vehicle Pilot Zone, will be conducted for the first time with multiple autonomous vehicles driving simultaneously. Participating teams must comply with road traffic laws and complete the designated driving course.

The total prize money for the final competition is approximately 300 million KRW, with the first-place team receiving 100 million KRW, second place 50 million KRW, third place 30 million KRW, along with various opportunities for site visits.

A Hyundai Motor Group official stated, “As the first completed vehicle manufacturer to hold an autonomous vehicle competition since 2010, the event has played an important role in activating autonomous driving technology development, nurturing future automotive talent, and discovering capable developers. Especially this year, holding the competition together with the Seoul Metropolitan Government at the world’s first 5G-converged Sangam Autonomous Vehicle Pilot Zone with an actual urban traffic environment is expected to elevate the status of the competition to a new level.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.