The Hyundai against the market

While most automakers in the country, especially the larger, adopts measures to cut production, as layoffs, layoffs and lay-off (suspension of employment contracts), Hyundai Motor of Brazil 12:0 am operates in three shifts and sometimes comes to summon workers for overtime on Saturdays. For this year, the Korean brand plans to repeat the same production volume reached in 2014, of 180 thousand vehicles, occupying so all the capacity of its factory in Piracicaba (SP).
The company's Chairman, William Lee, points out that the participation of the mark in the total market increased from 6.6% in the first quarter of last year, to 7.5 percent this year, with sales of 48.4 thousand vehicles, of which 37.2 million are of family models HB20, made locally, and the other imported or produced in partnership with the Caoa group, in Anápolis (Goiás).
"Despite the crisis, we have reduced our shares in the market and we are offering a product that has attracted consumers for their quality," says Lee. In the first half of the month, was the best-selling model HB20 in the country.
A differential in Hyundai's sales strategy is to offer the model with 30% of entry into the purchase financed, while most other brands of 40% to 50 asks%. "We're attracting a lot of parents who want to buy the first car for the kids", says the Executive.
Korean Lee, of 56 years, assumed command of the company in January 2013 and sees the current economic crisis as "healthier" than those recorded in 1997 and 2008, which were triggered by external problems. "The current pressure is internal, but Brazil has a strong economic base and, with fiscal adjustments, should recover next year".
New vehicle
The Executive expects a more sustainable recovery in the economy to begin to evaluate a new product plans for the Piracicaba plant-which can be a small sports-utility or a midsize car.
Also depends on the resumption decision to produce locally, engines and transmissions currently imported from Korea. "It's a step to be given when we have indicators to justify the increase in production," says Lee.
For now, he says, the intention is to keep the investment of $ 700 million for the construction of the factory, inaugurated at the end of 2012. The Brazil is the seventh country to receive a factory by the Korean group.
Export to countries of Latin America is also in the plans of Lee, but, according to him, does not depend only on the currency issue, "but a consistent demand by buyers, markets like Argentina and Mexico."
The Piracicaba plant employs 2.7 thousand employees and other 2.3 thousand people work at the park with nine suppliers of components installed around the factory.
At the very beginning of its operations, the Hyundai faced one day strike of workers claiming wage increase. "We have negotiated with the Union, we better understand the culture and the needs of Brazilians and, since then, we haven't had even one second of downtime," says Lee.
The Secretary General of the syndicate of the metalurgists of Piracicaba, Wagner da Silveira, claims that salaries of staff "factory floor" revolve around r $ 2.5 mil to r $ 2.7 thousand. "In fact, at the beginning we had some problems with the direction of Hyundai, but that has changed," he says.
For a better relationship with the Union and workers-who keeps weekly contacts through a program called "round table"-, Lee made Portuguese lessons one hour a day when they arrived in the country and today, due to the lack of time, developed a methodology of its own. He writes groups of a thousand words in English with translation into Portuguese and listen during your paths between the capital of São Paulo, where she lives, to the factory and even when you're brushing your teeth.