SEOUL, December 18 (AJP) - Tesla’s shares surged to a record high last Tuesday on CEO Elon Musk’s renewed push toward fully autonomous robotaxis — a breakthrough that drew cool look at Hyundai Motor’s lag in self-driving technology.
Tesla has been testing its robotaxi service in Austin, Texas since early this year. What began as supervised trials has moved further, with Musk signaling over the weekend that vehicles are now operating without a driver in the seat, reinforcing investor confidence that Tesla is nearing true autonomy.
The reaction in South Korea was notably different. Hyundai Motor shares slid 6 percent over the week to close Thursday at 282,500 won ($193.3), even as the benchmark KOSPI gained 1.4 percent on the day. Hyundai AutoEver, the group’s software and autonomous-driving arm, fell 3.37 percent to 272,500 won, extending losses after a sharp sell-off earlier in the week.
Autonomous driving — or the perceived lack of progress in it — is increasingly cited by investors as a structural drag on Hyundai’s valuation. While Hyundai Motor shares have risen 33.6 percent this year, the gain is still less than half of the broader market’s advance.
Hyundai’s autonomous-driving subsidiary 42dot has been testing self-driving buses in downtown Seoul, but the technology embedded in Hyundai and Kia production vehicles remains largely limited to basic driver-assistance functions such as acceleration, braking and lane-keeping. By global benchmarks, Hyundai has yet to reach the midpoint of the autonomy race.
Tesla, by contrast, demonstrated a fully autonomous 296-mile drive from Seoul to Busan in November without human intervention, though the journey was supervised. General Motors has also showcased its “Super Cruise” system on new Cadillac electric vehicles, a technology often compared to Tesla’s Full Self-Driving.
Both systems are generally classified as Level 2+ autonomy — legally requiring driver supervision but capable of lane changes, speed control and destination-based navigation.
Hyundai has said it aims to deploy Level 3 autonomous driving technology, which handles all driving tasks until the system requests human intervention, by 2027.
Leadership reshuffle adds uncertainty
Confidence in that timeline has been dented by recent leadership changes. On December 3, Song Chang-hyun, founder and CEO of 42dot and head of Hyundai’s Advanced Vehicle Platform division, resigned. He was followed by Yang Hee-won, president overseeing research and development at both Hyundai and Kia.
Yang’s role was filled by Manfred Harrer, a former Apple executive involved in the now-defunct Apple Car project. Following the reshuffle, Hyundai Motor Group Chairman Chung Euisun said the group would “prioritize stability over speed” in autonomous-driving development — a remark widely interpreted as an acknowledgment of setbacks in Hyundai’s transition toward software-defined vehicles.
Strategic bet on LiDAR under pressure
Beyond leadership churn, Hyundai faces a strategic dilemma rooted in its reliance on LiDAR technology, just as industry momentum pivots away from it.
On December 16, U.S.-based LiDAR supplier Luminar Technologies filed for bankruptcy protection following contract cancellations and weakening demand, shortly after Tesla confirmed successful robotaxi tests using only cameras and satellite data.
Industry consensus is increasingly shifting toward end-to-end deep learning models that emulate human decision-making rather than rule-based systems, paired with satellite-based data instead of costly LiDAR sensors.
Chinese automakers are moving quickly in the same direction. Xpeng recently launched the P7+, the world’s second electric vehicle after Tesla to achieve autonomous driving using cameras alone. Geely affiliate Geespace plans to deploy 72 low-earth orbit satellites by year-end to support high-precision driving data collection.
42dot presses on, but questions linger
Despite the shifting landscape, 42dot continues to project confidence. This week, it unveiled Ateria AI, a camera-based end-to-end autonomous-driving system. The announcement follows Hyundai Motor Group’s plan to build an AI factory equipped with 50,000 next-generation Nvidia Blackwell chips to accelerate so-called “Physical AI” initiatives across the group.
Still, uncertainty surrounds 42dot’s standing within Hyundai. In Thursday's sweeping year-end reshuffle that replaced more than 200 executives, no successor was named for Song — a signal some analysts interpret as a possible downgrade in strategic priority.
“The core reason Hyundai trades at a chronic discount is the fragmentation of its software capabilities across affiliates such as 42dot, Hyundai Mobis, Hyundai AutoEver and Boston Dynamics,” said Choi Tae-young, an analyst at DS Investment & Securities.
Analysts argue Hyundai must replicate the model it used to centralize its hydrogen business under the HTWO brand and establish a single command structure for AI and autonomous driving.
“Buying 50,000 GPUs or adopting Nvidia’s Drive platform is the easy part,” said Lee Hyun-wook, a researcher at IBK Securities. “The real challenge is empowering one lead entity to standardize data and fundamentally change how the organization works.”
The pressure is also mounting on Motional, Hyundai’s joint venture with U.S.-based Aptiv, which has yet to deliver a commercial robotaxi despite aggressive talent recruitment from rivals such as Amazon-backed Zoox.
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