At nighttime, Euljiro 4-ga in Seoul, long a home to craftsmen and hardware shops, takes on a wholly different look from the day. Walking the streets in the area during the day, you can see a variety of small shops selling ironware, wood, tool supplies and household goods such as lighting and tiles, as well as craftsmen with decades of experience. The streets ring with the roar of machines, and various tools and tiles wait for customers. When night falls and the metal and acrylic shops pull

Culture Oct. 10, 2020

Hyundai Mobis said Wednesday it invested $25 million in Envisics, a UK-based augmented reality head-up display provider. The auto parts company has been making investments in autonomous driving and electrification over the last three years in response to the growing need for self-driving cars. The augmented reality head-up display, or AR HUD, is a next generation safety convenience feature that matches driving information with the road ahead in real-time and projects it onto the windshield. &

Mobility Oct. 7, 2020

Posco International said Wednesday it has supported local parts manufacturers struggling from the pandemic. The nation’s largest trading company said it recently provided 1 billion won ($861,000) in export growth funds to Hanmea Adm, a steel parts manufacturer that produces aluminum products to reduce car weight, in cooperation with the Export-Import Bank of Korea. The funding is the result of the firm’s business partnership with Eximbank and Seoul Guarantee Insurance in May to bu

Industry Oct. 7, 2020

Hyundai Glovis said Tuesday it set up a new branch in Kazakhstan and signed a seven-year transportation business deal with local beverage firm RG Brands, its first move to target the logistics market in Central Asia. RG Brands, established in 1994, ranks second in the local beverage market. Under the partnership, Hyundai Glovis is set to carry out transportation business in Nur-Sultan, capital of Kazakhstan, and major cities such as Almaty and Shymkent. Its main task is to deliver produc

Mobility Oct. 6, 2020

LS Cable & System said Tuesday it completed construction of its second telecommunications plant in India and has doubled production capacity of communications parts.　 LS Cable plans to foster LS Cable & System India, or LSCI, as a specialized production base for communications harness to respond to India’s rapidly growing domestic market and target overseas markets such as Europe and North America. A communications harness is a cable component that connects mobile communications

Industry Oct. 6, 2020

SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won will hold his first face-to-face meeting with group management since the pandemic this month. According to industry sources, Chey and CEOs of SK Group’s major affiliates will gather on Jeju Island to hold its annual meeting CEO seminar and to discuss next year’s management strategies. SK Group said it has not yet finalized a schedule for the annual event. Every year, the meeting has been attended by Chey and his family members, including Senior Vice

Industry Oct. 5, 2020

The electric vehicle competition in South Korea is becoming fiercer with more local and foreign automotive brands launching their new electric cars in line with government support and the global environmental trends. In the first half of this year, 22,267 electric vehicles were sold here, up 23 percent from the same period last year, according to the Korea Automobile Manufacturers Association, although sales of EV passenger cars among them slightly declined 2.7 percent. The surge was mainly

Mobility Oct. 3, 2020

As Shinsegae Group heirs Chung Yong-jin and Chung Yoo-kyung became the largest shareholders of the group’s retail and department store units, respectively, upon receiving shares as gifts from their mother, they are expected to pay a combined 300 billion won ($256 million) in gift taxes, according to the industry. According to a regulatory filing on Monday afternoon, Shinsegae Group Chairwoman Lee Myung-Hee donated an 8.22 percent stake in E-mart to her son, Yong-jin, and an 8.22 percent

Industry Sept. 29, 2020

NEW GENESIS IN CAMOUFLAGE -- Genesis unveiled its first GV70 teaser image wrapped in camouflage Tuesday. Genesis emphasized the brand’s identity by attaching the G-Matrix pattern camouflage film to the GV70. The GV70 is the fifth vehicle in the Genesis lineup, and is a rear-wheel-drive-based luxury midsize sport utility vehicle. (Hyundai Motor)

Mobility Sept. 29, 2020

Kim Dong-kwan, Hanwha Group Chairman Kim Seung-youn’s eldest son, was promoted to president of Hanwha Solutions, a year after he was promoted to vice president, the group said Monday. “Kim, who was in charge of the strategy division with the launch of Hanwha Solutions in January this year, led the reorganization of the business and the discovery of future projects to make a leap toward eco-friendly energy and high-tech materials companies, and contributed to the creation of a s

Industry Sept. 28, 2020

South Korea’s antitrust watchdog said Monday that it has drafted a bill to regulate dominant online platform operators as unfair trade has become a reality in the sector amid the surge in digital transactions caused by the pandemic. The proposed Act on the Fairness of Online Platform Transactions will be announced for 40 days starting Sept. 28. “As the platforms’ influence and position are strengthened in the digital economy, there are also various threats that hinder the

Industry Sept. 28, 2020

Amid the slowdown in global trade in the wake of the pandemic, many South Korean companies see changes in global value chains as inevitable, a survey showed Sunday. According to a recent survey of 300 Korean manufacturers by the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry, 41.7 percent of the respondents said they were “experiencing the GVC changes” and 27.3 percent said they were “expecting changes.” As the biggest factor affecting the restructuring of global value chains

Industry Sept. 27, 2020

The nation’s largest automaker, Hyundai Motor, said Sunday that it had unveiled new cars and technologies targeting China at the 16th Beijing International Automotive Exhibition, which kicked off a day earlier. The automaker said it showcased a technology brand, called “H Smart+,” exclusively for China. The space consists of three areas: a clean field that focuses on electric cars and hydrogen cars, a connected field showing connectivity technology such as Baidu 3.0 and B

Mobility Sept. 27, 2020

As daily confirmed coronavirus cases in South Korea returned to three-digit figures ahead of the Chuseok holiday, tensions are mounting at large companies, which recall painful memories of shutting down their factories during the first wave of the pandemic early this year. The nation’s largest automaker Hyundai Motor said it sent letters of cooperation to all of its employees at its Ulsan plant twice in an effort to prevent the spread of COVID-19. In the letter, the carmaker asked emplo

Industry Sept. 24, 2020

Service exports contributed more to South Korea’s economic growth than exports of goods for the first time since 2015, data showed Wednesday. According to the latest report from the Korea International Trade Association, service exports accounted for 0.5 percent of the nation’s gross domestic product growth in 2019, the highest percentage since 2014. Korea’s GDP growth stood at 2 percent, and exports of goods accounted for 0.2 percent of that growth. Service exports have i

Industry Sept. 23, 2020