South Korea joint venture: Eberspaecher expands customer base to include Hyundai Kia

Esslingen/Hwaseong City (ots) - In order to supply Hyundai Kia,
exhaust specialist Eberspaecher, located in Esslingen, Germany is
collaborating with South Korean car supplier Wooshin Industrial of
Dangjin City. As a first step, a joint venture has now been set up
for the South Korean market under the name of Wooshin Eberspaecher AG
in Hwaseong City. Further joint ventures to supply the Korean vehicle
manufacturer are planned around the world.

"Thanks to the co-operative link-up with Wooshin we are able to
expand our customer base to include Hyundai Kia", explains
Eberspaecher CEO Dr. Thomas Wuensche. Until now the leading exhaust
specialist has been represented in the South Korean market by a sales
and development branch office; this is the first time it has ventured
into local production.

In future, Wooshin Eberspaecher AG will supply so-called hot ends,
i.e. particulate filters and catalytic converters, to manufacturer
Hyundai Kia in its home market. Currently, joint venture partner
Wooshin Industrial Co. Ltd., which has around 330 employees, supplies
Hyundai Kia in South Korea with muffler assemblies - so- called cold
ends - and exhaust manifolds.

An important component of the co-operation agreement is the agreed
know-how and technology transfer. Wuensche stresses: "With
Eberspaecher's technological edge in diesel and hot end technology,
Wooshin will be able to adopt an excellent strategic position in the
domestic market".

The Korean car group is also set to be supplied with hot and cold
ends in future via further joint ventures of the two partner
companies in international markets, for example the USA, India,
Russia, Czech Republic, Slovakia and Brazil.

Eberspaecher ranks amongst the leading system developers and
suppliers of exhaust technology, vehicle heaters and bus air
conditioning systems worldwide and is also involved in automotive
electronics and automotive bus systems for electronic networking in
the vehicles. Its customers include almost all European and North
American, and increasingly more Asian manufacturers of passenger cars
and commercial vehicles. In 2009, the internationally positioned
group of companies, with approximately 5,300 employees, posted sales
of over 1.3 billion Euros.

Press contact:
J. Eberspaecher GmbH & Co. KG
Gabriela Schoppe
Head of Public Relations
Eberspaecherstrasse 24
73730 Esslingen
GERMANY

Phone: +49 711 939-0224
Fax: +49 711 939-160224
gabriela.schoppe@eberspaecher.com
http://www.eberspaecher.com/