seoul hyundai motor co an early backer of hydrogen cars has watched the electric rise of tesla including on its home turf nows its going on the offensive in the batterypowered market led by its us rivalthe south korean company plans to introduce two production lines dedicated to electrics vehicles evs one next year and another in 2024 according to an internal union newsletter seen by reuterseuisun chung leader of the hyundai motor group conglomerate that also includes kia motors has also held a series of meetings since may with his counterparts at samsung lg and sk group which make batteries and electronic partsthe purpose of the talks which were publicly announced was for hyundai to try to secure batteries at a time of tight supply as the race for evs intensifies according to several industry sources those manufacturers also supply the likes of tesla volkswagen and gmhyundai told reuters it was collaborating with korean battery suppliers to scale up its electric car production efficiently it declined to comment on any plans to introduce dedicated production linessamsung lg and sk declined to commentthe moves indicate the carmaker is moving aggressively to expand its electric capacity days after chung announced on july 14 that hyundai motor group aimed to sell 1 million battery evs a year and grab a global market share of over 10 by 2025theres some way to go hyundai motor group sold 86434 battery evs last year according to data from industry consultant lmc automotive that was above the 73278 sold by volkswagen group but behind the 367500 delivered by teslahyundai the worlds no5 automaker together with kia motors said its agility allowed it to lead the charge into evs we are certain hyundai is never going to fall behind it addedno kodak momenta senior hyundai insider who declined to be identified because of the sensitivity of the issue said the company had not been concerned about tesla when the silicon valley company was producing highend carsbut it became more worried when tesla brought out a cheaper model 3 in 2017 according to the insider who described it as a strategic victoryno traditional automaker has been successful yet in catching up with tesla which retains an edge in battery and software technologyhyundai could also face a roadblock from its powerful union which is worried about job security as evs require fewer components and workers than gasoline vehicles at hyundai this is partly because the automaker makes a number of key components for conventional cars inhouse while many ev parts are outsourced at presentthe union is pushing for the company to assemble key ev components like battery packs and motors inhouse to offset any reduction in workforcewe are not opposed to ev business kodak went bankrupt because it stuck to film even as the industry was shifting to digital photography union spokesman kwon ohkook told reuterswe just want to protect the jobs of our members he saidhyundai said automakers and unions needed to accelerate change to remain