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Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news.

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Speaker 2: Joining us is someone who has to chart the course

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Speaker 2: amid a dynamic let's say, dynamic trade landscape. Hondai Motor

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Speaker 2: CEO Jose Munios joins us here on set. Great to

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Speaker 2: have you here. I know you're here for the New

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Speaker 2: York Auto Show, so really appreciate you dropping by seven

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Speaker 2: thirty one. Les, talk to me first about your cars.

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Speaker 2: Very popular in the US. Your business has grown tremendously.

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Speaker 2: You have Hyundai, you have Kia, you have Genesis, which

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Speaker 2: Katie I do bought one of, and you produce a

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Speaker 2: lot more cars than people would expect here in the

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Speaker 2: United States.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, you're right, So thank you much for having me

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Speaker 3: so with supplaicit being that we do so, you're absolutely right.

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Speaker 3: So we are now the third largest oem A globally.

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Speaker 3: And then definitely it is not new, but for the

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Speaker 3: last six years or so, we have come to the

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Speaker 3: conclusion that the USA is the most important market for

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Speaker 3: US globally and it's meant to continue to do so.

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Speaker 3: So today we have factories in Alabama and in Georgia,

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Speaker 3: and just three weeks ago we open a brand new

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Speaker 3: factory in Savannah, Georgia to increase production by another five

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Speaker 3: hundred thousand cars, so we produce about forty percent of

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Speaker 3: the car that we sell in America here in America.

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Speaker 3: And then we are with these five hundred thousand more cars,

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Speaker 3: we're going to get to one point two million cars produced.

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Speaker 3: This is a big undertaking.

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Speaker 1: I do have one minor correction. I actually lease my Genesis.

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Speaker 1: I didn't buy it, and okay, I kind of wish

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Speaker 1: I had, because I'm worried about car prices rising, and

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Speaker 1: you did promise that you wouldn't raise your prices through

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Speaker 1: June second, and I'm curious. I'm not just asking for

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Speaker 1: myself either, what happens after June second to that price pledge.

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Speaker 3: Well, first and foremost, you know, as mentioned, we are

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Speaker 3: very committed to this market. We announced just three weeks

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Speaker 3: ago in the White House with our executive chair, Mister

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Speaker 3: cho our big commitment to America with a twenty one

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Speaker 3: billion dollar investment in this country in the next five years.

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Speaker 3: So this means that we're going to increase capacity up

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Speaker 3: to one point two million cars, but we are also

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Speaker 3: going to increase everything that has to do with the

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Speaker 3: supply chain to be able to produce those cars, including

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Speaker 3: green and steel. So we're building a six billion a

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Speaker 3: state of the art green steel factory. We call it

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Speaker 3: the Electric ARCT Furness in Louisiana. And in addition to that,

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Speaker 3: we are investing in new technologies like Boston Dynamics, bringing

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Speaker 3: more chips to America with Nvidia, also in autonomous viving,

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Speaker 3: with Emotional and even with ebitols supernal here. So this

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Speaker 3: is really big. So thanks to those investments, we're able

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Speaker 3: to produce cars like Juice I'm Glad you like it.

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Speaker 3: DV seventy is the most popular Genesis, followed by the

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Speaker 3: GB eighty and it's produced here in America in our

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Speaker 3: plant in Alabama.

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Speaker 4: So, as a company that has made bigger commitments twenty

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Speaker 4: one billion through twenty twenty eight, this is another fourteen

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Speaker 4: thousand direct jobs that you reported. What do you think

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Speaker 4: more largely of the terror of posturing by the Trump administration.

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Speaker 4: Do you think some of it is actually working to

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Speaker 4: bring more factory jobs on shore in the United States,

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Speaker 4: or do you think that there's a real risk here

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Speaker 4: that a lot of component parts gets so expensive that

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Speaker 4: it dwarts a lot of buying in this country.

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Speaker 3: Well, in our case, we actually took the decision to

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Speaker 3: invest in our new Savannah plant during the first Tramp administration.

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Speaker 3: So you don't build a plant overnight, and you don't

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Speaker 3: build plants thinking on incentives. So we took this decision

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Speaker 3: some time ago, and then this came to fruition just

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Speaker 3: three weeks ago, as mentioned, and then we don't look

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Speaker 3: at things in the short Obviously we like free trade.

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Speaker 3: We think in our global business because the components come

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Speaker 3: from all over the world, free trade is the best

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Speaker 3: for our business. But our commitment is such that we

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Speaker 3: have to navigate through this situation. And in fact, when

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Speaker 3: all these tariffs and uncertainty came to life, we wanted

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Speaker 3: to reassure our customers that we would guarantee their prices.

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Speaker 3: So that's why we came up with this the Handai

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Speaker 3: Customer Assurance Program to ensure we will not increase prices

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Speaker 3: during this period. Then after that we will evaluate the situation,

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Speaker 3: but we will always focus on bringing the best product

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Speaker 3: to the market with the highest safety rates. We're number

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Speaker 3: one in America in terms of top safety Pick Plus,

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Speaker 3: and then with the best quality and good features. And

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Speaker 3: you have to always be competitive regardless of tariffs.

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Speaker 2: Can I ask about the rest of your supply for

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Speaker 2: the US market? I think about forty percent you make

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Speaker 2: in the US, right, I'm pretty sure that you produce

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Speaker 2: cars in Mexico for the rest of the world. And

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Speaker 2: then we get a lot of South Korean imports from

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Speaker 2: Hondaikia and Genesis. Is that? Am I doing the math correctly?

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Speaker 2: And then how does that Korean supply look? Are you

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Speaker 2: talking to the White House? Are you talking to South

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Speaker 2: Korea about getting carve outs?

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Speaker 3: Well, in our case, in the case of Handaid Motor Company,

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Speaker 3: we produce in the US. We don't produce in Mexico.

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Speaker 3: Really maybe very minor, but we took a concert decision

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Speaker 3: to invest here in the USA. The other the rest

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Speaker 3: of the production comes mainly from South Korea. Well, we

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Speaker 3: are part of the ALIAS for Automotive Innovation. John Bosella,

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Speaker 3: the President is representing the industry and it's conveying to

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Speaker 3: the government the needs that we have in the industry,

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Speaker 3: which are pretty much common across the board. And then

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Speaker 3: we know that there are some discussions between the South

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Speaker 3: Korean government and the White House. We are not actively

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Speaker 3: part of that discussion. And then obviously I cannot reveal

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Speaker 3: what they talk about. But definitely we all want to

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Speaker 3: ensure that there is a a plain level field for

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Speaker 3: everybody so that we can compete in good terms in

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Speaker 3: the market, and we want to be competitive. I maintain

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Speaker 3: this message for the consumer. We will be competitive and

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Speaker 3: then the market will decide, depending on the supply and demand,

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Speaker 3: if there's going to be some price increase or not.

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Speaker 3: But again, we need to be competitive, right, So that's.

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Speaker 1: What I was wondering. I mean, what does competitive mean?

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Speaker 1: Does that mean you're eating the costs to keep your

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Speaker 1: market share, you know, keeping your costs that consumers pay,

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Speaker 1: car buyers pay, and willing to take the head or

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Speaker 1: you know, how does that dynamic work?

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Speaker 3: That dynamic is not different to the way it's being

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Speaker 3: done over the last thirty years or so. It's simply

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Speaker 3: in the short term and an additional burden to manage

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Speaker 3: given all the implications of the of the supply. Again,

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Speaker 3: our job is to focus on what we can control.

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Speaker 3: The cause is something we can control. How we responding

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Speaker 3: to the increase in tariffs, localizing investing mode in the

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Speaker 3: country so that we don't get to be hit by tarifts.

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Speaker 3: That's a simple solution and then on the revenue side,

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Speaker 3: we'll have to see how the market reacts. If we

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Speaker 3: have the opportunity to take maybe some reducing centives, increased

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Speaker 3: price here there, we will do. But you're not going

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Speaker 3: to see like a huge increase all of a sudden,

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Speaker 3: or we are not planning to remove cards from the

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Speaker 3: portfolio simply because of the tariffs, et cetera. Again, the

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Speaker 3: most important is a good product, safe product, good quality,

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Speaker 3: good features, and be competitive in the market. And then

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Speaker 3: the rest is our job to try to optimize localizations.

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Speaker 4: Honda I coo amazing coverage here because of course certainly

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Speaker 4: very dynamic let's call it time in of sheriffs, and

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Speaker 4: also the time for the New York Auto Show. I

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Speaker 4: grew up going there every year of my life, so

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Speaker 4: looking forward to seeing you there