Hyundai Motor moves to buy all stakes at Turkish subsidiary

ISTANBUL

South Korean automotive giant Hyundai Motor on Dec. 17 applied to the Turkish competition authority to buy 30 percent stake of Hyundai Assan from Kibar Holding in a bid to become the absolute owner of the Turkish carmaker.

Hyundai Motor, the world’s fifth-biggest auto group, currently holds 70 percent stake of Hyundai Assan.

The Turkish company, which is running a plant with an annual capacity of 230,000 units in the northwestern province of Kocaeli, exported 150,000 vehicles to the European market last year. During the pandemic, however, exports declined some 10 percent.

In the domestic market, it ranked ninth with 25,831 car sales in the first 11 months of this year.

“The decision should be deemed as an attempt to use sources more efficiently,” Kibar Holding chairperson Ali Kibar told Bloomberg on Dec. 17, hinting plans of new investments is “more profitable areas.”

On Dec. 11, Hyundai Motor and its chairperson agreed to buy a controlling stake in Boston Dynamics from SoftBank Group in a deal that values the U.S.-based robot maker at $1.1 billion.

The South Korean automaker group said the purchase would help it expand automation in its vehicle factories and design autonomous cars, drones and robots, as it seeks to turn itself from a manufacturer into a broader mobility service provider.