Jin Eun-sook, president at Hyundai Motor Group's ICT Management division, speaks during a press event at the company's headquarters in southern Seoul on Aug. 12.HYUNDAI MOTOR
Adopting AI exposes companies to security risks, but remains indispensable for those seeking to lead the AI era. Hyundai Motor Group has embraced this calculus, developing a proprietary generative AI platform that grants employees free access to models including ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude.
More than eight in 10 Hyundai office workers and engineers now rely on AI tools that have slashed the amount of time required to complete certain tasks by as much as 90 percent, the company said at an event detailing progress on the digital and AI transformation initiatives at its Yangjae headquarters in southern Seoul on Wednesday.
Hyundai's internally developed H Chat Pro, a platform granting secure access to multiple generative AI models, helps employees carry out tasks ranging from document drafting, information retrieval, data analysis and code development.
Its user base surpassed 30,000 as of July, roughly 80 percent of the group's white-collar and researcher staff.
Hyundai's AI push follows Executive Chair Euisun Chung's 2018 pledge that Hyundai would become "more of an information technology [IT] company than IT companies themselves."
In research and development, a so-called Crash Safety AI Assistant aggregates data once scattered across disparate systems such as historical crash test results, imagery and analytical reports, enabling engineers to cross-reference comparable cases.
Hyundai Motor Group Executive Chair Euisun Chung, third from left, gets training on coding at the company's headquarters in southern Seoul on Aug. 12.HYUNDAI MOTOR
The tool has compressed research and review time by roughly 90 percent, Hyundai said.
On the factory floor, AI now performs real-time quality verification, cross-checking vehicle identification numbers against production records. The technology is being used in Hyundai's some 70 manufacturing sites worldwide, including in Korea, the United States, Europe, India, and the Asia-Pacific region.
Hyundai said AI in manufacturing cut costs by 5.24 billion won ($3.7 million) annually.
AI is also being used in customer service, where it now parses and categorizes app reviews, generating tags and draft responses automatically.
Processing time per review has fallen from an average of 35 minutes to just five, with AI now handling more than 85 percent of all customer feedback. Full automation service is slated for September.
"Our ambition isn't simply to be the company that uses AI most extensively, but the one that deploys it most effectively worldwide," said Jin Eun-sook, president at Hyundai Motor Group's ICT Management division. "We will continue strengthening our capacity to rapidly absorb emerging technologies and translate them into customer value and business results."
