Hyundai Mobis steps up future mobility business

Hyundai Mobis Co., South Korea’s largest auto parts maker, is accelerating its future mobility businesses as well as intensifying open innovation with global tech firms.

The car parts maker announced its mid- to-long-term strategy in March 2021 for sustainable growth. At the time, the firm said it will implement its full-scale business transformation in three directions. 

The first pillar is strengthening its future mobility technologies in electrification, autonomous driving and connectivity to increase sales to the global market. The second pillar is expanding its new mobility business models based on the company’s core technological competencies. The last is seeking opportunity areas outside the traditional automotive business, such as aerial mobility and robotics, to find long-term growth engines.   

Since the announcement of the plans, the car parts maker has spurred strategic investment in global tech firms as well as growing its own research and development capabilities in chips and software.

For example, Hyundai Mobis invested in Supernal LLC, Hyundai Motor Group’s Washington D.C.-based air mobility (UAM) affiliate, in April 2021. In June 2021, Hyundai Mobis completed the acquisition of US robotics firm Boston Dynamics from SoftBank for around 1 trillion won ($762.6 million).   

The auto parts maker injected $4 million in Silicon Valley-based high-resolution radar startup Zendar to accelerate level 4 or higher self-driving technologies, becoming the first company to invest in Zendar at the corporate level.     

Additionally, Hyundai Mobis has been strategically investing in Silicon Valley-based Velodyne Lidar since October 2019 for the development of autonomous driving lidar systems. Also, the Korean company injected $25 million in UK-based Envisics in August 2020 to jointly develop head-up display (HUD) and augmented reality.   

The company will execute bold investments in its new businesses. In February of this year, Hyundai Mobis said it will spend up to 8 trillion won over the next three years for future mobility, UAM, robotics and other areas.

In specific, the firm will inject 3 trillion-4 trillion won in auto chips, software and self-driving businesses and invest the remaining 3 trillion-4 trillion won in facility expansion and upgrades for electric vehicle component production.

The company said it will preemptively invest in future mobility based on a solid understanding of the global market, as well as boost collaboration with smaller tech firms.

Write to Hyung-Kyu Kim at khk@hankyung.com
Jihyun Kim edited this article.