Hyundai Mobis is reducing its reliance on Hyundai Motor and Kia, but it still has not escaped a high level of about 75%. Even for Humanoid Robot parts, cited as a next-generation growth engine, the trend is likely to continue for the time being because they will likely be used first by its affiliate Boston Dynamics. Hyundai Mobis plans to increase overseas orders centered on advanced electrification components.
According to the auto industry on the 9th, as of the third quarter of last year, Hyundai Motor and Kia accounted for 39% and 36%, respectively, of Hyundai Mobis' sales. Compared with a year earlier, Hyundai Motor was down 1.7 percentage points, while Kia was up 0.8 percentage point.
In 2024, the shares of Hyundai Mobis' sales were 41.2% for Hyundai Motor and 34.9% for Kia. Considering that in 2023 Hyundai Motor and Kia were 43% and 35.3%, respectively, dependence is decreasing little by little each year, but the combined share of Hyundai Motor and Kia remains high at around 75%.
Reducing revenue dependence on Hyundai Motor and Kia is a core task for Hyundai Mobis. Thanks to Hyundai Motor Group's long-standing vertical integration, Hyundai Mobis was able to grow stably. However, there is a limitation in that if Hyundai Motor and Kia face business difficulties, it inevitably falls into a slump together. In fact, when Hyundai Motor and Kia's sales plunged in the late 2010s, Hyundai Mobis' performance also deteriorated.
To break out of this situation, Hyundai Mobis has focused on winning business from global automakers other than Hyundai Motor and Kia. In 2023, Hyundai Mobis agreed to supply electric vehicle chassis modules to Mercedes-Benz and dedicated electric vehicle battery system assemblies (BSA) to Volkswagen. It is also supplying BSAs for plug-in hybrids (PHEVs) to Stellantis. In addition, it signed supply contracts with companies in China and Japan.
Despite a string of overseas orders, the affiliate sales share did not decrease because Hyundai Motor and Kia's global sales kept rising. A Hyundai Mobis official said, "Orders and sales from non-affiliates increased a lot, but Hyundai Motor and Kia's global sales increased by a much larger margin."
Hyundai Mobis has recently been focusing on the robot parts business as a new growth engine. Some say that if Hyundai Motor Group goes into mass production of the Humanoid Robot Atlas, the affiliate sales share for Hyundai Mobis, which supplies robot parts, will grow even larger in the short term.
Earlier this month, Hyundai Mobis said it would supply actuators for the Humanoid Robot Atlas to Boston Dynamics, Hyundai Motor Group's robotics subsidiary. Actuators are core parts that serve as the joints of a Humanoid Robot, and some analyses say they account for more than half of manufacturing costs. If Boston Dynamics mass-produces Atlas and related sales grow, affiliate sales will inevitably increase again.
Hyundai Mobis plans to target the global parts market more aggressively to raise the sales share of non-affiliates to over 40% by 2033. In auto parts, it will focus on the electrification components market, such as by wire, rather than mechanical systems. By wire refers to components that replace mechanically operated steering and braking systems with electronic ones.
In robotics, it plans to use the performance achieved through supplies to Boston Dynamics as a springboard to expand to other robot manufacturers across the board. Hyundai Mobis also recently created a dedicated organization, the "Robotics Business Promotion Office." It plans to increase robotics-related staff from the current level of about 100.
A Hyundai Mobis official said, "We are pushing a transition into new business areas such as automotive semiconductors and Robotics based on competitiveness in key components like electrification and electronics," adding, "Based on this, we plan to expand the share of overseas customer sales to 20% in 2027 and 40% in 2033."