Chairman Chung Eui-sun's 1 Year, Full Acceleration as a Pioneer of Future Mobility

Electric Vehicles, Hydrogen Cars, Autonomous Driving, Robotics, UAM and More: Accelerating Next-Generation Mobility
Raising the Name as a 'Hydrogen Energy Evangelist'

[Asia Economy reporters Changhwan Lee and Jehun Yoo] It will be one year on the 14th since Chung Euisun, Chairman of Hyundai Motor Group, succeeded his father, Honorary Chairman Chung Mong-koo, to become the top leader of the group.

Under Chairman Chung's leadership, Hyundai Motor Group is rapidly transforming by advancing future mobility businesses such as eco-friendly vehicles, autonomous driving cars, robotics, and Urban Air Mobility (UAM). Chairman Chung is especially noted as a hydrogen energy evangelist, leading the development of Korea's hydrogen economy.

Providing Humanity with a New Mobility Experience

"We will realize eco-friendly means of transportation for customers, including electric vehicles that combine performance and value, and hydrogen cars equipped with world-class hydrogen fuel cell technology."

In his inaugural speech on October 14 last year, Chairman Chung declared that he would become a ‘pioneer.’ He aims to create a completely new future mobility market to realize humanity’s dream of ‘safe and free movement and peaceful life’ together.

He emphasized early realization of imagined futures such as autonomous vehicles, robotics, Urban Air Mobility (UAM), and smart cities?representative future mobility technologies?to provide humanity with a higher level of life experience.

Since taking office, Chairman Chung has been rapidly implementing these promises. A representative example is the acquisition of the global robotics company Boston Dynamics last December with an investment of about 1 trillion KRW. Hyundai Motor Group’s first collaboration with Boston Dynamics involved deploying their flagship quadruped robot ‘Spot’ on a trial basis at Kia Autoland Gwangmyeong to detect hazards inside the factory and ensure safety.

Visible achievements are also emerging in autonomous driving. Last month, at ‘IAA Mobility 2021’ held in Germany, Hyundai unveiled the actual robo-taxi jointly developed with Motional, based on the dedicated electric vehicle Ioniq 5, for the first time.

The UAM business, which has taken its first steps, is his dream. After establishing a local subsidiary in Washington D.C. with a scale of 200 billion KRW, he is leading overseas market development by building a cooperative system with the city of Los Angeles as well.

He has not forgotten to contribute to society through win-win cooperation. A representative case is the establishment of Gwangju Global Motors (GGM), Korea’s first ‘labor-management win-win job’ model. The compact sports utility vehicle (SUV) Casper produced through GGM recorded 18,940 reservations on the first day, gaining great popularity.

Chung Euisun, Chairman of Hyundai Motor Group

Chung Euisun, the Global Hydrogen Economy ‘First Mover’

Since becoming chairman, Chairman Chung has solidified his position as a genuine global hydrogen economy ‘First Mover.’ He attended the Hydrogen Economy Committee chaired by the Prime Minister as his first official schedule and has been actively promoting the hydrogen economy both domestically and internationally since the end of last year. He is also the one who declared the ‘popularization of hydrogen energy by 2040.’

Hyundai Motor Group began overseas production of hydrogen fuel cell systems by launching the HTWO brand and starting construction of its first overseas hydrogen fuel cell system factory, ‘HTWO Guangzhou,’ in Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, China, at the end of last year.

The pinnacle was the ‘Hydrogen Wave’ event held last month. At this event, Chairman Chung stated, "The future hydrogen society vision that Hyundai Motor Group dreams of is to make hydrogen energy usable by anyone, for everything, anywhere," and announced plans to fully eco-friendly commercial vehicles. This is the first case among global automakers.

Chairman Chung has also established his status as a hydrogen leader in the domestic business community. Since early this year, he has met consecutively with SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won, POSCO Group Chairman Choi Jeong-woo, and others to strengthen intentions for cooperation in hydrogen-related technologies and businesses, and in March, he led the establishment of the Korean version of the Hydrogen Council.

The result is the ‘Korea H2 Business Summit,’ known as the Korean version of the Hydrogen Council. Building a hydrogen ecosystem cannot be solved by the efforts of a single company alone. The summit included 15 companies such as Hyundai Motor Group, SK, POSCO, and Lotte Group.

Chairman Chung’s other vision is to maintain a ‘super-gap’ in the hydrogen field. He plans to invest about 1.3 trillion KRW to establish Hyundai Mobis plants in Incheon and Ulsan to add a production system capable of 100,000 hydrogen fuel cell systems annually. He aims to maintain a super-gap over competitors like Toyota.

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