POSCO Int'l to export EV motor cores to Hyundai Motor, Kia plants in Europe

An electric vehicle with its mechanical details displayed shows its motor core assembled at its bottom. Courtesy of POSCO International

Parts that make up POSCO International's motor core / Courtesy of POSCO International

POSCO International broadened its market for electric vehicle (EV) motor cores in Europe by finalizing a supply agreement with Hyundai Motor Group's EV plants in Turkey and Slovakia, according to the trading arm of POSCO Group, Thursday.

The deal is expected to cement the company's strategic market expansion in Europe and broader goal of increasing manufacturing bases worldwide in order to reach 10 percent of the global EV motor core market.

With the latest deal, POSCO will supply 550,000 motor cores to the group's plant in Turkey and 480,000 to another plant in Slovakia from 2025 until 2034. The parts, before being shipped to the plants, first go through an electrification plant at Hyundai Mobis' factory in Slovakia. The parts are for EVs the global car giant is set to assemble at its factories in Europe for the first time.

The deal has allowed POSCO International and its subsidiary behind the motor core's technological development, POSCO Mobility Solution, to supply to the group a total of over 11.8 million motor cores for the past 15 months.

The deal came after POSCO last June established an invested firm in Poland to build a local EV motor core plant. The plant to be built in Brzeg is in the vicinity of the country's southwestern border region flanking Germany, Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary where manufacturing plants for other global complete car brands are located.

The plant, once completed next year, will produce and supply 1.2 million EV motor cores each year until 2030.

Near the last year's end, POSCO completed a plant in Suzhou in China's southern province of Jiangsu which can produce 900,000 EV motor cores each year. The company also began operating its first plant in Mexico last October and plans to start building another local plant during the first half of this year.

"We are expanding our manufacturing bases worldwide to reduce the risks of trade barriers for EVs and thus supply more promptly our parts to complete car companies in overseas," a POSCO International official said. "At the center of our motor cores is hyper non-oriented electrical steel, a technology we exclusively possess in the country. It has improved the energy-loss problem of conventional electrical steels."