Rivian, Hyundai make Georgia a major car player

In the last six months alone, Georgia has won double victories, bringing in more than $ 10 billion in investment in the automotive industry and more than 15,000 installation works.

In late December, California upstart EV Rivian announced The plant is worth $ 5 billion outside of Atlanta. This project provides 7,500 jobs and awareness of creating a promising autostart.

At the time, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp noted that Rivian’s investment, received $ 1.5 billion in state and local incentives, was the largest economic development project in the state’s history.

But on a hot afternoon in mid-May, Kemp returned to announce a new contender for the title: South Korean Hyundai Motor Group said it would find its first specialized EV factory in the world about 30 miles northwest of Savannah, Georgia. The $ 5.54 billion project will create 8,100 jobs in manufacturing and an additional investment of $ 1 billion by suppliers.

“After today,” Kemp said at the event announcing the deal with Hyundai in May, “no one can doubt that Georgia is … an unrivaled leader in a country developing in the electric mobility industry.”

Kemp’s Deputy Chief of Staff Bert Brentley said the mobility industry, which relies on the automotive sector, is a top priority for Georgia’s economic development.

“We’ve spent the lion’s share of our time and effort in this industry because it’s an action,” Brantley said. Automotive news last week. “We were very deliberate about that.”

This meant creating the soil needed to take automotive production to the next level.

Last summer Kemp founded Georgia Electric Mobility Innovation Alliance to help recruit EV manufacturers. The public-private initiative between government, industry, utilities and universities focuses on developing charging infrastructure, work programs, supply chains and innovation.

“This shows that Georgia is ready to invest in the manpower and ecosystem needed to support assembly plants,” said Brentley, former director general of the Georgia Department of Economic Development.

Georgia has worked to assemble and prepare ready-to-build industrial facilities to help prospects automakers run their plants faster.