[이코노믹리뷰=최동훈 기자] Hyundai Motor Company has suspended plans for corrective action (recall) for Kona Electric, a compact electric SUV. As a result, the point in time for customers concerned about vehicle fire accidents to receive recall measures is far away.
According to industry sources on the 20th, Hyundai Motor Company did not submit the Kona Electric recall plan to the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport on the 19th. The schedule for future submissions was not announced.
Although Hyundai did not reveal what actions were included in the recall plan, it is known that the industry intends to replace the battery of Kona Electric that was shipped from the Ulsan plant for a certain period of time. The recall cost was also estimated at 1 trillion won. It is reported that Hyundai Motor Company will share the recall cost with LG Energy Solution, a battery supplier.
The reason why LG Energy Solutions shares the cost of the recall is that it is estimated that the cause of the Kona Electric fire is the battery. As of this day, the cause of the fire has not been clearly identified. However, it is analyzed that all 15 fire accidents at home and abroad occurred from May 2018 to the 23rd of last month before Kona Electric was released for the first time in the battery.
Since the controversy over the Kona Electric fire in the second half of last year, both Hyundai Motor Company and LG Energy Solutions confronted whether the cause of the fire was in the battery. The Automobile Safety Research Institute under the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport has conducted an investigation to determine the cause of the fire after the controversy.
According to the fact that Hyundai Motor Company decided to submit a recall plan this time, it was analyzed that the results of the investigation by the Korea Automobile Safety Research Institute came out. However, the Automobile Safety Research Institute did not announce the recall results on the same day, and Hyundai Motor Company and LG Energy Solutions did not separately explain the cause of the fire.
Two situations can be expected as to the reason why Hyundai Motor Company has delayed submitting the recall plan. It is presumed that the Korea Automobile Safety Research Institute decided to review the results of the analysis on the cause of the fire, or both Hyundai Motor Company and LG Energy Solutions tried to fulfill their moral responsibility, such as replacing all batteries regardless of the cause of the fire.
According to the first scenario, the Korea Automobile Safety Research Institute has been in a hurry to conduct an investigation under pressure such as market demand, and the investigation period may have been extended more than originally planned. The Automobile Safety Research Institute (hereinafter referred to as the researcher) launched an investigation into the cause of the accident after the controversy over the Kona Electric fire in October last year. The researcher said it would conclude the investigation and announce the cause of the fire by the end of last year. However, it is expected that the industry will take at least six months to determine the cause of the fire. In fact, the researcher was unable to publish the results at the end of last year, and the investigation continued until recently. The decision to recall Hyundai Motor Company and LG Energy Solution may have been pushed back inevitably as the announcement schedule was overturned after attempting to announce the results.
In the second scenario, there is a possibility that the position on how much each Hyundai Motor Company and LG Energy Solution will bear the recall cost was just before the submission of the recall plan. LG Energy Solutions announced that it had set a certain amount of provisions related to the Kona Electric fire in a conference call for 4Q 2020 earnings held on the 27th of last month.
The provision for LG Energy Solutions, which also reflects the cost of the US home energy storage system (ESS) recall, amounts to several hundred billion won. Considering this, it is concluded that LG Energy Solutions analyzed that the cost of recalling Kona Electric, worth KRW 1 trillion, would be lower than that of Hyundai. This means that LG Energy Solutions has publicly declared that it is less responsible for the recall of Kona Electric in front of investors than Hyundai Motor Company. In this case, it is inevitable to confront Hyundai Motor Company.
Currently, the official announcement of the researcher who will reveal the cause of the Kona Electric fire from a neutral standpoint is considered the only opportunity to resolve the controversy.