SUCCESS STORIES - HYUNDAI TURKEY
Hyundai Motor Company, which is leaping fast forward in recent years, is drawing attention as one of the fastest growing brands in automotive sector with its global operations.
Established in 1967, Hyundai Motor Company has important manufacturing plants in Korea, USA, China, India and Turkey and all the vehicles are sold at almost 200 countries around the world.
Turkey has a very important place for Hyundai Motor Company and strategically positioned Hyundai Assan Plant is the most considerable link between South Korea and Europe. Turkish customers first met the Hyundai brand in 1990, when Assan Hyundai M.A.S A.Ş. became Hyundai Motor Company’s distributor for Turkey. After a short period, Kibar Holding had negotiations to build Hyundai branded vehicles in Turkey and by taking the government’s approval in December 1993, it had started working on a new plant. The groundbreaking was done in 26th of September 1995 and it was completed in a record-breaking 15 months time. Hyundai Assan Industry and Trade Inc. Plant started production in July 1997 and the official opening ceremony was realized on the 20th of September, 1997. The plant, which has 100,000 units of annual production capacity, in İzmit-Ali Kahya region has a million square meters plot of land, 700,000 square meters of factory site and 108,000 square meters of production site.
Hyundai Turkey Plant currently produces Matrix and Accent passenger car models, as well as Starex light commercial vehicle group and acts as Hyundai Motor Company’s gateway to Europe. Turkish built Accent, Matrix and Starex models are exported to most European countries, especially Germany, France, Italy, Spain and Portugal, and also to Middle East and North Africa covering over 60 countries in total. Hyundai’s Atos Prime, Getz, Coupe FX, i30, Sonata, Grandeur passenger cars, Tucson and Santa Fe 4×4 vehicles and Starex Light Truck and H100 Light Truck models are imported from South Korea. The employment of Hyundai Assan is around 2,500 people.
Hyundai Turkey Plant has done the biggest export increase in the automotive sector with 71% and gained approximately 360 million USD. In 2006 Hyundai Assan exported 34,630 cars and light commercial vehicles but just in first 6 months of 2007, this number reached up to 32,158 units. A total of around 70,000 vehicles are planned to be exported from Hyundai Turkey plant in 2007. Domestic sales of Hyundai in the first 6 months of 2007 are realized as 16,965 units. Now having accession talks with European Union, Turkey has more importance for Hyundai Motor Company and Izmit Plant will be one of the key role-players on the way to Hyundai Motor Company’s global target to be “One of the 5 Biggest Auto Manufacturers” in the world by 2010.
