Industry

Kia Motors earmarks over 2 trillion won for research

Kia Motors said Tuesday that it would invest over 2 trillion won ($1.9 billion) in research and development in 2018.

For this year, Kia has earmarked a total of 2.069 trillion won for R&D, up 26 percent from 1.642 trillion won spent a year earlier, a company spokesman said.

The planned R&D expenditure does not include investment in facilities, the spokesman said, adding the money will be mainly spent on future car technologies such as autonomous driving.

In 2017, the portion of R&D spending out of total sales stood at 2.85 percent. Kia posted 53.536 trillion won in overall sales last year.

Yonhap