Hyundai, Nvidia deepen AI alliance with $6.5 billion Saemangeum plan

Hyundai Motor Group used its San Francisco AI Summit on July 25 to lay out a broader Physical AI strategy that extends beyond its existing alliance with Nvidia, positioning itself as a company spanning autonomous driving, robotics and AI-defined factories. Executive Chair Euisun Chung said the group aims to move from intelligent devices such as vehicles and robots to intelligent spaces such as AI factories, and ultimately to integrated intelligence at the city level. The plan builds on Hyundai’s manufacturing footprint, robotics operations centered on Boston Dynamics and a data flywheel designed to feed real-world manufacturing, mobility, logistics and robotics data back into AI model development. Hyundai said it will deepen work with Nvidia on a Robot Reference Platform for universities, research institutes and startups, while also using Nvidia technology for digital twins in production facilities and autonomous-driving systems in vehicles. The group said last year’s memorandum of understanding with Nvidia and a supply agreement for 50,000 Blackwell GPUs remain part of that effort. Hyundai also detailed parallel partnerships with Waymo and Google DeepMind. It said IONIQ 5 vehicles with autonomous-ready modifications will be produced at Hyundai Motor Group Metaplant America in Georgia, while Boston Dynamics’ partnership with Google DeepMind is intended to advance next-generation humanoid robots. Hyundai plans to build a U.S. robot production facility with annual capacity of up to 30,000 units by 2028, with Atlas first to be deployed at production sites including HMGMA before wider rollout. In South Korea, Hyundai reiterated plans tied to Saemangeum AI Valley, where it said about KRW 9 trillion will go toward AI data centers, robotics manufacturing clusters, electrolyzer plants and AI hydrogen city infrastructure, and said it will invest KRW 42 trillion over the next decade in advanced industrial hubs in the Yeongnam region.