▲From left, Kim Jong-bae, CEO of Innomotive, and Dong Gwang-poo, CEO of Pudong Original Company (Photo courtesy of Innomotive)

Promoting commercialization with future car parts companies centered on small and medium-sized enterprises with global competitiveness
Phase 1 pilot project $1.6 million contract signed… Service scheduled to start this November

Innomotive has taken a bold step forward into the ASEAN market by signing a contract with a Vietnamese company to supply a battery-swappable micromobility service platform.

Innomotive, a special purpose eco-friendly vehicle (PBV) platform company centered on swappable smart battery packs, announced on the 28th that it has exchanged a final agreement for a pilot project worth a total of USD 1.6 million with Vietnam's PHU DUONG ORIGINAL COMPANY LIMITED (CEO DuongQuang Phu).

This contract is being signed after signing a basic agreement with a local business operator as part of the Gwangju Green Car Promotion Agency's 'Demand-based Partner Value Chain Enhancement and Self-reliance Package Support Project' at the automobile parts exhibition held in Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam on June 21.

The plan was to supply multipurpose electric vehicles (classified as “farm power vehicles” in Korea) for local management of 30,000 Vietnamese resorts with 650,000 rooms, centered around the famous resort destination of Da Nang, but the scope of support has been expanded to include local tourist taxis, electric two-wheelers, and low-speed transport vehicles for cargo movement using a unified battery pack.

Final pilot project by the end of November Three regions will be selected, and approximately $534,000 will be invested in each location to provide battery swap charging stations and demonstration vehicles linked to solar power generation.

The pilot project will run until February 2024, and the goal is to improve the platform to suit the local environment based on the empirical data obtained through the pilot project before proceeding with the main project.

PHU DUONG, a local Vietnamese company, is in charge of selecting the pilot project area and on-site installation and operation, while Innomotive will supply battery-swappable multi-purpose electric vehicles and battery charging stations, as well as transfer technology related to operating a local service platform.

The pilot project sites currently under review are known to include: Binh Thuan Province, which is actively promoting the development of coastal tourist cities; Lam Dong Province, which has the mountainous resort of Dalat; and Da Nang, a representative resort city well known in Korea. However, CEO Pu Dong said he was surprised by the local response from Vietnam, saying that inquiries are pouring in from other regions as well, rather than promoting commercialization together.

After completing the pilot project in February 2024, facilities for local production in Vietnam will be established in the second half of the year, and the company has decided to actively review investments worth 20,000 units per year (approximately $100 million) with the ultimate goal of entering the ASEAN market.

Since visiting the Vietnam exhibition in June, the Vietnam Korea Business Association (VKBIA, Chairwoman Tran Hai Linh) has been connecting local Vietnamese governments and enterprises with specialized Korean companies with excellent technological capabilities by visiting local governments and enterprises in August and personally supporting them.

Gwangju Green Car Promotion Agency is also actively supporting this pilot project and is working with the Korea Institute of Industrial Technology to create a horizontal electric vehicle ecosystem with global competitiveness.

Kim Jong-bae, CEO of Innomotive, said, “The ASEAN market, including Vietnam, is the most important for us. “This is an important target market, and this pilot project is important because it provides an optimized platform based on actual commercialization results, not just possibilities in a market where hundreds of millions of two-wheeled vehicles have been distributed,” he said.