On day eight of Plus3 South Korea, we had the opportunity to visit two of the largest companies in the entire country: TK Elevators and the Esteemed Hyundai Motors. On this day, our company visits took us out of Seoul and to Asan city. While urban, the city is also surrounded by rice fields and agricultural areas that are conducive to large factories and corporate infrastructure for corporations much like the ones we visited.

Hyundai Motor Company

With the production of the IONIQ 6, Hyundai Motors cemented itself as one of the largest and most innovative automobile companies in the world. During our trip to Asan, we had the chance to tour the automobile production facilities for the IONIQ 6, Sonata, and AZERA. At the beginning of the tour, the group gathered in the administration building to view a video on the company’s mission statement and how the Asan plant is working to meet these corporate goals. In the showroom, we saw models of concept cars as well as cars currently in production that are surpassing company expectations. I can say with certainty, based on the concept cars that Hyundai has planned for both the immediate and far future, that the IONIQ 9 and others will be smashing successes in the United States, Korea, and all over the world.

After finishing up at the headquarters, we embarked on a guided tour of the manufacturing line, where we got to witness sheets of metal being turned into fully operational cars. The factory itself is a hive of music, grinding, and sheet metal reverberations, all echoing from a variety of smart systems ensuring the safety and efficiency of the factory. At the Asan plant, the welding of cars is completely automated, with sometimes less than 100 workers overseeing designated machine shops. Self-driving forklifts and robotic arms inspecting the quality of sheet metal molds were common sights throughout the tour and were an eye-opening experience into how futuristic concepts are being utilized daily in the automobile industry. As only an estimated 3% of cars require manual inspections/fixes, most of the workers are there to oversee the process. The plant itself produces approximately 1,100 cars within each 24-hour period with an 8-hour shift where the plant is not in operation. Hyundai’s manufacturing process was wonderful to behold and helped me realize some of the lesser-obvious ways in which smart systems protect employees from dangerous work.

TK Elevators

Touring TK Elevators was yet another chance to witness a wonder of smart systems and efficient manufacturing processes. Upon our arrival, we all stared up in amazement at the elevator testing tower that reaches 40 stories into the sky amongst the flat plains and rice fields that surround it. When we entered the headquarters, we were met with a beautiful office with a variety of amenities catered to employees to boost morale. The offices are very similar to the ones I have experience with at Own Data Company. They are adorned with a golf simulator, gym, healing areas, table tennis, and even a fully functional cafeteria for employees. Not only does TK Elevators care about their employees, but they also showed us great hospitality and were very excited by our visit.

For our tour of their facilities, the employees shared their tour guide responsibilities with a robot that acted much like a Roomba as it went around the room and explained the mission statement and facets of the company. TK Elevators is one of the leading elevator companies in the world with over 1,000,000 units installed around the globe. Their success is largely due to their testing tower that gives them the opportunity to try concepts like “twin elevators” and “lateral/vertical elevators”. In the testing tower, we learned about how they plan on increasing efficiency by having two elevator cars in one shaft and how they plan on increasing convenience with elevators that can also move left and right between shafts. TK Elevators makes fast, reliable elevators that buildings can count on all over the world, but it is because of their innovation and drive to push the limits of their work that they are so successful.