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| This rendered image shows Hyundai Motor's electric vehicles under its IONIQ brand. / Courtesy of Hyundai Motor |
By Baek Byung-yeul
Hyundai Motor made its first appearance at the IFA electronics trade fair in Berlin in an effort to promote its eco-friendly products and technology including its IONIQ electric vehicle (EV) brand and hydrogen fuel cell technology, the carmaker said Friday.
"Hyundai Motor decided to participate in the IFA for the first time to strengthen its eco-friendly mobility technology leadership in Europe which has seen soaring demand for EVs and fuel cell vehicles due to stricter environmental regulations," the company added.
The IFA, one of the three large tech fairs in the world along with the Consumer Electronics Show and the Mobile World Congress, is currently taking place in Berlin and features many related online events due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
At an online event, the company held a discussion on the potential of hydrogen fuel cell technology. The company also introduced its EV models which will be released under the IONIQ EV brand. The upcoming EVs will be manufactured based on its Electric-Global Modular Platform (E-GMP), Hyundai Motor said.
For Hyundai Motor Group, the European market is regarded as one of the core pipelines as the market accounted for 14.2 percent of Hyundai Motor and Kia Motors' total sales volume in 2019, following 18.2 percent from the North American region and 17.3 percent from the domestic Korean market.
"Hyundai Motor has been continuously developing future mobility technology. We are also pursuing a future where various kinds of eco-friendly mobility ranging from EVs to fuel cell vehicles can co-exist," Albert Biermann, president at Hyundai Motor, said via a company statement released in Korean.
Hyundai Motor is also a leader in the fuel cell vehicle sector. The carmaker shipped 10 hydrogen fuel cell electric trucks to Switzerland in July, Korea's first exports of hydrogen-powered commercial vehicles.
The company plans to export 40 additional hydrogen fuel cell trucks to Switzerland by the end of the year and will export a total of 1,600 trucks to the country by 2025.
