The Chairman of the Board of the Hyundai Motor Group $005380Euisun Chung, met with leading representatives of global companies, including the heads of Nvidia $NVDA (+0.92%) and CATL $3750 (+0.56%)to discuss future growth drivers such as AI, robotics and hydrogen.
From January 4 to 13, Chung undertook a ten-day tour of three major economies with significant global influence - China, the United States and India - to advance global management efforts while inspecting key manufacturing facilities on the ground.
Chung first visited China on January 4 and 5 to attend the Korea-China Business Forum, where he held in-depth discussions on EV batteries with CATL Chairman Robin Zeng. CATL established a subsidiary in Korea last year and announced plans to expand its business in the country.
He also met with Hou Qijun, Chairman of China Petroleum & Chemical Corporation (Sinopec), to discuss hydrogen-related business.
Hyundai is currently the world's largest manufacturer of hydrogen vehicles and produces hydrogen fuel cell systems at its HTWO Guangzhou hydrogen business center in China. Sinopec is also promoting hydrogen as an important strategic industry and has recently commissioned a green hydrogen plant with an annual capacity of 20,000 tons.
Mr. Chung met with Mr. Zhang Naiwen, Chairman of Jiangsu Yueda Group, Kia's joint venture partner in China, where both agreed to strengthen their long-term, future-oriented partnership.
Hyundai launched its first EV model exclusively available in China, the "Elexio", in October last year and plans to expand its local EV lineup to six models by 2030. Kia is expanding its EV portfolio in China by launching at least one new electric model every year from 2023 to 2027, starting with the EV6.
After his China trip, Chung traveled directly to Las Vegas on January 6, where he met with executives from global technology companies, including Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia, and Akash J. Palkhiwala, COO of Qualcomm. He also visited the booths of major companies at CES 2026, the world's largest IT and consumer electronics trade fair.
Chung's reunion with Huang also raised expectations that Hyundai might adopt Nvidia's Alpamayo autonomous driving AI, a new technology unveiled at CES 2026. The first production model to be equipped with this system will be the upcoming CLA from Mercedes-Benz.
Hyundai and Nvidia have expanded their cooperation in several areas, including a contract for the supply of 50,000 Blackwell GPUs.
Chung's next destination was India, where he visited the Hyundai plant in Chennai in southeast India, the Kia plant in Anantapur in central India and the Hyundai plant in Pune in the mid-west of the country from January 12 to 13 to learn about local production and sales performance as well as medium- to long-term growth strategies.
Hyundai Motor, which entered the Indian market in 1996, currently ranks second in the country with a market share of around 20 percent.
"Kia has been present in India for eight years now and the market offers significant growth potential and opportunities," he said. "By leveraging our DNA - acting quickly once a target is set, not being afraid of failure and bouncing back quickly even when we fail - we need to achieve sustainable growth and build a resilient, strong brand."