Hyundai Showcases $7.6B Georgia EV Plant, Announces Expansion
Carmaker Plans to Increase Plant’s Capacity to 500,000 Vehicles Per Year From 300,000
Hyundai EVs on the assembly line at the company’s new plant in Ellabell, Ga., on March 26. (Mike Stewart/Bloomberg News)
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ELLABELL, Ga. — Hyundai celebrated the opening of its new $7.6 billion electric vehicle factory in Georgia on March 26 by announcing plans to expand its production capacity by two-thirds to a total of 500,000 vehicles per year.
The news came as President Donald Trump planned to announce tariffs on auto imports at the White House. Hyundai will be spared from those tariffs on its U.S.-made vehicles. Trump praised the South Korean automaker March 24, saying its American investments are “a clear demonstration that tariffs very strongly work.”
Hyundai began producing EVs just shy of six months ago at its sprawling manufacturing plant in southeast Georgia. More than 1,200 people are working there.
With employees in blue shirts filling bleachers behind him March 26, Hyundai Motor Group Executive Chairman Euisun Chung said the company plans to increase the plant’s capacity from 300,000 vehicles per year to 500,000. He said it shows Hyundai has come to Georgia “to stay, to invest and to grow.”
“Standing here today, I can say I have never been more confident about building the future of mobility with America, in America,” Chung said.
Workers help assemble Hyundai EVs. About 1,200 people work at the plant right now. (Mike Stewart/Associated Press)
Hyundai Motor Co. CEO Jose Munoz said the Georgia expansion was “like building a new plant.”
Hyundai employees worked the assembly line March 26 alongside hundreds of robots that stamp sheets of steel into fenders and door panels, weld and paint auto bodies and even park finished vehicles awaiting their final inspections.
The plant that sprawls across 3,000 acres churns out a finished vehicle about once a minute. Its currently producing two electric SUV models — the Ioniq 5 and the larger Ioniq 9.
The newly announced Georgia expansion is part of $21 billion in U.S. investments over the next three years that Hyundai announced at the White House with Trump on March 24. They also include a $5.8 billion steel mill in Louisiana to produce auto parts for Hyundai’s assembly plants in Georgia and Alabama.
Chung told Trump at the White House: “We are really proud to stand with you and proud to build the future together.”
Robotic apparatuses moves on the floor at the Hyundai EV plant. (Mike Stewart/Associated Press)
Before the expansion was announced, Hyundai and battery-making partner LG Energy Solution said they plan to employ 8,500 total workers at the Bryan County site, about 50 miles west of Savannah. Hyundai didn’t immediately say whether more workers would be hired.
During the first half of 2024, the Ioniq 5 was America’s second-best-selling electric vehicle not made by Tesla.
Hyundai took less than two years to start making EVs in Georgia after breaking ground in the fall of 2022. It was the largest economic development project the state had ever seen, and it came with a whopping $2.1 billion in tax breaks and other incentives from the state and local governments.
EVs accounted for 8.1% of new vehicle sales in the U.S. last year, up from 7.9% in 2023, according to Motorintelligence.com.
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