Hyundai Motor Co and Kia Motors Corporation have announced a 100 million euro investment in London-based electric-vehicle company Arrival Ltd.
This marks the start of a strategic partnership between the three companies to jointly accelerate the adoption of commercial electric vehicles (EVs) world-wide.
Hyundai and Kia will use key Arrival technologies to help achieve their recently announced goal of developing mobility services and electrifying their vehicle fleets.
Arrival (
www.arrival.com) is re-imagining vehicle design and assembly to create ‘Generation 2’ electric vehicles — designed from a blank sheet and surpassing traditional vehicles in cost and efficiency (‘Generation 1’ electric vehicles are fossil-fuel vehicles retrofitted with electric power trains).
The company’s vehicles are assembled in small-footprint micro-factories, located in areas of demand and profitable at thousands of units. The company has over 800 employees in five countries.
The partnership will use Arrival’s flexible platforms and technologies to create new purpose-built EVs in many vehicle categories.
Hyundai and Kia will leverage Arrival’s micro-factories and software innovation, while Arrival will benefit from the OEMs’ global footprint and economies of scale.
This will help to accelerate the ‘Two Track’ strategy adopted by Hyundai, to bring zero-emissions battery and fuel cell technologies to the commercial-vehicle market.
Denis Sverdlov, founder and CEO of Arrival, said: “We have created a game-changing product category — Generation 2 EVs — while Hyundai and Kia make world-class vehicles with uncompromising quality.
“This strategic partnership will empower our companies to scale Generation 2 electric vehicles globally.”