Hyundai Motor Group held an Open Innovation Tech Day occasion in Seoul on Friday throughout which the Group introduced its present and future methods with contributors throughout the international startup ecosystem and shared the outcomes of its open innovation initiatives so far.
Hyundai Motor Group plans to safe future revolutionary progress engines by establishing cooperative relationships with numerous choose startups around the globe, whereas persevering with to help and nurture their international development.
The Group introduced that it has invested KRW 1.3 trillion in additional than 200 startups since 2017 up till the primary quarter of 2023, when it started strengthening its open innovation actions. These funding numbers exclude main investments, reminiscent of Boston Dynamics, Motional, and Supernal.
The Group has invested in quite a few enterprise areas, together with electrification, connectivity, synthetic intelligence (AI), autonomous driving, renewables, robotics, and mobility companies. By phase, mobility companies recorded round KRW 700 billion funding in tasks, together with mobility service firms reminiscent of Seize in Singapore and OLA in India. Electrification and connectivity adopted with KRW 280 billion and KRW 126 billion, respectively. The Group has additionally invested KRW 60 billion in AI, 54 billion in autonomous driving, and 25 billion in power, together with hydrogen.
“Startups that may result in constructive adjustments in individuals’s lives by means of revolutionary applied sciences or companies are the businesses we’re in search of,” Yunseong Hwang, Vice President and Head of Open Innovation Execution Group at Hyundai Motor Group, stated. “We are going to set up a coexistence ecosystem by actively investing in startups that present essential insights into the creation of future good and sustainable mobility options and enhancing wellbeing and high quality of life for humanity.”
Hyundai Motor Group’s Open Innovation initiative is basically embodied in 4 kinds of funding: sensing funding to establish traits in fast-changing new progress enterprise areas; linked funding to advertise precise cooperation in response to anticipated strategic synergy; strategic funding to instantly or rapidly safe enterprise capabilities, and firm constructing for inside startups with needed applied sciences and enterprise areas for the Group.
Hyundai Motor Group operates international innovation hubs referred to as ‘CRADLE’ in 5 international locations: the USA, Germany, Israel, China, and Singapore. The Group has additionally established ‘ZER01NE’ in Korea, which serves as a hub for open innovation. Moreover, the group operates a complete of 19 funding funds in main international locations, with a concentrate on securing international funding capabilities to help startups.
ZER01NE, which was established in 2018, has recruited startups by means of its ZER01NE Accelerator program with the intention to find priceless startups and discover the probabilities of strategic use instances of their revolutionary applied sciences. It has additionally expanded its open innovation initiatives to varied areas past vehicles additionally, working its ZER01NE Playground for collaborations with artists and creators.
The Group additionally operates an in-house startup system referred to as ‘ZER01NE Firm Builder’, which is on the market for executives and workers of group firms to foster in-house startups. A complete of 30 in-house startups have spun off, producing cumulative gross sales of KRW 280 billion. These startups have been acknowledged for his or her market worth and enterprise feasibility, resulting in the hiring of greater than 800 new workers.
The Group will proceed its daring collaboration methods with numerous startups that can remodel the long run primarily based on inventive concepts. Open innovation areas which are newly sought embody Software program Outlined Autos (SDVs), useful resource circulation, semiconductor, synthetic intelligence (AI), and quantum expertise.
Main initiatives by means of ZER01NE program
On the Open Innovation Tech Day, Hyundai Motor Group additionally introduced its main instances of investments and collaboration with key startups which have efficiently grown by means of the ZER01NE program.
IONITY, the European EV high-speed charging infrastructure firm, is a consultant instance of profitable outcomes by means of the Group’s funding. As of the top of 2022, round 450 charging stations have been in-built 24 European international locations, with roughly 2,000 high-speed chargers put in. Hyundai Motor is collaborating with IONITY by offering a premium bundle that allows IONIQ 5 prospects to make use of the corporate’s charging services for one yr, along with offering fairness funding.
Rimac Automobili, the Croatian ultra-high-performance electrical automobile firm invested in by Hyundai Motor Group in 2019, has established a cooperative relationship. The corporate has skilled fast progress, with a company worth of EUR 2.2 billion. Rimac Automobili has contributed to the development of high-performance electrical automobile expertise at Hyundai Motor and Kia by means of numerous joint tasks.
IonQ, a U.S. quantum computing firm well-known in Korea as a consequence of its affiliation with Professor Kim Jungsang of Duke College, has been conducting numerous joint analysis tasks with Hyundai Motor Group since receiving funding from the group in 2021. These tasks embody upgrades to autonomous driving and battery expertise.
SoundHound, a US voice recognition answer firm, obtained funding from the Group between 2011 and 2020. The corporate is offering voice recognition companies that function in Hyundai, Kia, and Genesis fashions bought in North America and India.
Suresofttech is an organization in Korea to reach growing and commercializing software program verification expertise. Hyundai Motor invested within the firm in 2012 and 2017 and is conducting software program verification collaboration on automobile controllers and linked automobile methods. Based mostly on its collaboration with Hyundai Motor Group, Suresofttech has grown into a world expertise firm and is increasing its enterprise to varied fields reminiscent of nuclear energy, protection, rail, and aviation.
In the meantime, Hyundai Motor Group’s ZER01NE open innovation platform participated for the primary time on the 2023 CES held in Las Vegas in January. ZER01NE laid the muse for international enlargement by introducing ten home startups in cooperation, together with 60 Hertz, eMotiv, ArgosVision, and CellPlus Korea. The Group will proceed to go away no stone unturned in its pursuit of the perfect and most revolutionary applied sciences to develop sustainable cellular options and profit humanity.