Coffee is delivered by robots. Only the CEO has their own office. The test track covers 1.26 million square meters and is replicated in 8,000 pieces of Lego. Oh, and mind-reading and transforming tires are a thing.
Yet still, still, the only thing I can think about is a two-year-old French car with no cup holders. Sixteen cylinders, eight liters and four turbos went someway to making up for the lack of beverage storage. We’ll get to that.
For now, welcome to the world of Hankook. Or part of it. The Korean part.
Heading east, bound for Toyota City, it seemed only sensible to pop in on one of the World Rally Championship’s key stakeholders.
This week’s Rally Japan marks the very middle of Hankook’s maiden term as the WRC’s control tire supplier. There have been highs and lows since the start of last year and we arrive in Seoul with nine-time world champion Sébastien Ogier’s acerbic social media post still fresh in the mind.
Steven Cho is the man in charge. Over dinner, it’s clear the elephant in the corner of the restaurant hasn’t escaped him either. With trademark composure, Cho takes the Frenchman’s criticism in his stride. That’s not to say he underplays it, quite the opposite. His response is coherent, balanced, rational and laced with the willingness and desire to both learn and be better moving forwards.
Cho’s not interested in soundbites. He’s about a solid work ethic and a quiet, dignified, head down approach. He’s not alone. Across all three of the firm’s Seoul sites, the desire and determination to get it right is palpable. But where does Hankook sit in terms of global tire players? With the tender application document for the 2028-30 supply agreement about to open, what chance is there of a second term?
That’s what we’re here to consider.
Not far into the first presentation within Hankook’s HQ building (known as Technoplex – an amalgam of technology and complex), the firm’s global reach becomes more obvious. Yes, this is an Asian-rooted company, but did you know its plants in the United States, China, Hungary, Indonesia and, of course, Korea help produce more than 100 million tires every year – the seventh biggest tire-maker on the planet?
Then there’s the innovation, the energy-harvesting LED tire which will help charge your EV by making use of the dynamic movement within the tire as the car goes over bumps or through compressions. The mind-reading tire is probably a little bit further away, as is the expanding off-road option which runs wider with a smaller circumference on the sand before it grows taller and narrower back on the asphalt.
The air-less tire? It’s not quite round the corner, but it’s not a million miles away.
Technodome, Hankook’s research and development center, is packed with ideas and inventions. The building itself is stunningly Star Wars yet futuristic, with laboratories around every corner where rubber is being stretched, boundaries redrawn and the future reimagined. Like the Technoplex, there’s a tranquility within the building. Yes, this is the beating heart of a multi-billion-dollar tire giant, but it’s a place of work where the employees reflect a shift in the Korean way of working.
Woking? Nope - this is Hankook's Technodrome in South Korea
Both buildings come complete with a gym, library, doctor’s surgery, wellbeing clinic, therapists, an 80-child creche open 12 hours a day, restaurants and, in Technodome, residences (which can be accessed through a James Bond-esque tunnel to make sure you don’t get too hot or too cold). It’s all about helping deliver a better work-life balance. And, by extension, improved productivity.
And then there’s Flashbot – the robot which will deliver a beverage of your choice to your desk. If you have a desk, that is. Well, everybody has a desk, but not many employees get to call their desk their home. Every Monday morning you head over to a digital display and select a seat for the week. Who’s sitting next to you for the next five working days? Who knows. Could be anybody within the company. Apart from those on the c-floor, nine storeys above.
This is where the chiefs hang out, but only the CEO gets his own office. The others have small desks. And they really are small. Why? To encourage the company leaders to be mobile, to get out there and talk to their colleagues and co-workers – communication is the key to greater efficiency and to the future.
Back to that future and Hankook’s second term. There’s no doubting the commitment to the World Rally Championship and the desire to build on its current three-year agreement. Be under no illusions, Hankook is enormously ambitious and has every intention of making a nuisance of itself among what’s considered the established French-Italian axis of tire-making order.
It’s no surprise, therefore, to see a couple of Formula 1-specification tires in the Technodome. Is it under consideration? Yes it is. When F1’s next tender is opened, Seoul will be taking a good deal of interest. Not that that will come to the detriment of the WRC. Hankook understands the significance of a story shaped by cars running tires and racing roads used by you and me on a daily basis. Rallying’s relevant application is not lost to those moving between downsized desks on the ninth floor.
After everything I’ve seen in the last couple of days, it’s impossible not to see Hankook through a different lens
The not inconsiderable sum of all of those parts is only equal to what gets rolled out at the Technoring. We’ve moved some way south of Seoul and its suburbs to find 1.26 million square meters where the rule is run over every tire. This is Asia’s biggest tire testing facility, complete with 13 different tracks, offering every surface under the sun.
The off-road course is, of course, our natural habitat and dunking Dynapros into 50 centimeters of water before driving up and down steps and across some of the rockiest roads this side of Sleeping Warrior is nice. But today we’re all about the asphalt. Especially when we’re sitting just a handful of inches above said asphalt and accelerating (and braking) at a rate which is just bending the mind slightly.
We’ve joined a test of the Ventus Evo, Hankook’s premium ultra high-performance tire. And with one fitted to all four corners of a Bugatti Chiron, we set off in search of the dry handling course.
The sensation of 1500bhp and 1600Nm of torque propelling you towards the horizon is quite astonishing. I’ve been fortunate to ride in rally and rallycross cars which are capable of performance similar to this, but that comes with all the drama of a competition car. The Chiron came with total comfort, the wafting aroma of freshly valeted leather seats and no hint of a cup holder.
The power was both pure and linear from stand still to warp factor whatever as first mile disappeared in the blink of an eye – all in the name of research and development. Being completely honest, I’ve never been a huge fan of hypercars. I’ve changed my mind now.
That said, I’m really not sure the Chiron qualifies as a car. At times, taps open, it honestly felt more like a plane with no wings. How cheesy does that sound? Apologies for that sentence, but it’s actually true. The full-force push as the 285 fronts and 355 rears transferred all that power into forward motion was something else. Behind us, forced induction and internal combustion combined to create the sort of sound I’ve simply never heard before. Sam, my super-talented test driver smiled.
“The orchestra…”
Sensory overload didn’t come close.
Then came the corners. Sighting lap done, we were on it and the face-shaping Gs just built and built. Through some twisties the track opened up with a medium-to-high-speed left-right.
“Let’s go…” offered Sam, opening the steering and delivering more throttle. The response from a car weighing more than two tons remains something I simply can’t quite fathom. I’ve tried, gone back over those moments, thought through the dynamics and applied the engineering side of my mind and still my considered view hasn’t changed.
The Chiron was deeply impressive; as are Hankook's facilities
The resultant jumble of words remain as incoherent and sweary now as they were then.
Madness. It was just pure madness.
Moving through the laps on the handling circuit, you could feel the Ventus start to flex, warming up and surrendering to the towering power being applied. This was when I started to think less about the car and more about the connection to the road. What those tires were dealing with was nothing short of astonishing. The small slides were progressive, controlled and the only undramatic aspect of this ride. And that’s testament to the work of Hankook.
After everything I’ve seen in the last couple of days, it’s impossible not to see Hankook through a different lens. This is one of the most forward-thinking, motivated and clearly capable companies I’ve seen in action for years.
Second term? Yes please.
