April 27, 2024

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[THE INVESTOR] Hyundai Motor said on Nov. 15 it has invested in a US unmanned aerial vehicle company to jointly develop new products.

In the investment, Hyundai Motor and Top Flight Technologies will jointly seek business opportunities in the global high-end aerial drone market, the company said in a statement.

“In addition to solving the challenges of longer-duration flight for quadcopters, Top Flight is developing the technologies needed to enable new solutions in aerial logistics and mapping which could be useful in Hyundai‘s future business,” John Suh, vice president of Hyundai CRADLE in Silicon Valley, said in the statement.

Hyundai CRADLE is the carmaker’s venture and open innovation business in the United States.

“Hyundai’s investment in Top Flight confirms its commitment to autonomous vehicles and mobility solutions, whether on the road or in the air. We fully believe that Hyundai’s world-class assembly and automation capabilities will help spur the production and deployment of aerospace-grade UAVs, more efficiently than ever,” Top Flight CEO Long Phan said in the statement.

The US startup is unrivaled in the fields of cutting-edge unmanned aerial vehicles equipped with small-sized gasoline engines that can sharply extend the vehicles’ range by charging a battery, it said.

Hyundai didn’t provide how much it has invested in the US startup.

By Song Seung-hyun and newswires (ssh@heraldcorp.com)