Hyundai Motor Group to break ground on Saemangeum AI data center in 2027

Hyundai Motor Group plans to begin construction of an AI data center in Saemangeum, South Korea, in March 2027 and start operations in early 2030, according to The Elec. The group said on October 30 that five affiliates had finalised decisions to invest in the facility: Hyundai Motor, Kia, Hyundai Mobis, Hyundai Engineering & Construction and Hyundai AutoEver.

The group plans to create separate companies in November for data center construction and infrastructure, and for securing GPUs and providing computing services. The project is part of the group's 9 trillion won AI Valley investment plan in Saemangeum. In September, the group began setting up a company for a 200 MW solar power project.

The data center will provide computing infrastructure for autonomous driving, robotics and manufacturing AI. It will train autonomous driving models on data from real roads and simulations, and use digital twin environments to train robot behaviour models.