Korean Cars and Other Things Coming Out of The Delegation Visit

Noah Note

Of course the time a delegation is in town my body decides to turn on me. I apologize for bwing so late to things. I have been deathly ill and sleeping most the time, but did wanna respons to some news out there.

Steven Chase over at Globe and Mail was the first to break todays MOU regarding Automotive between Korea and Canada. You can of course find the full thing here.

Here is the important quote for Automotive Hats off to Globe and Mail for getting it:

“The MOU on Korea-Canada Industrial Collaboration on Future Mobility and the Establishment of the Korea-Canada Industrial Cooperation Committee is non-binding but pledges both sides to working together to promote the manufacturing of autos, electric vehicles, battery manufacturing and hydrogen-powered vehicles.

The agreement says Ottawa and Seoul will work on "advancing a Korean automotive industrial footprint in Canada" as well as "electric vehicle (EV) manufacturing opportunities."

It also says the two countries will co-operate on "growing Korea's battery manufacturing presence in Canada" as well as the battery supply chain including "manufacturing, critical mineral extraction and refinement, research, development and extraction."

The MOU says this accord recognizes the "complementarity of the two economies and their significant potential for cooperation in the industrial sector."

It also talks of co-operation on hydrogen-powered commercial vehicles and a stable hydrogen production and supply chain.”

Of course this is a non-binding MOU and one that so far sets only the exploratory process of what a potential Korean expansion into Canada would look like. However it does give us a good idea of what is in the cards, particularly a keen interest on Hydrogen.

Hydrogen has been the hot topic of the last week regarding Hyundai. We were the first to report on the Canadian governments lobbying for Automotive investments as part of CPSP back in November. Something i’m proud of. As we reported at the time, there has been extreme hesitation from Hyundai Motors Group to invest significantly in Canadian production.

Hyundai did have a short-lived presense in Canada back in the 90s with the Hyundai Bromont plant lasting briefly till 1993. Often forgotten is that inclided an Ontario facility as well. Anyways, Hyundai has been extremely hesitant throughout the whole process on investing in Canada, including production-wise.

We here previously speculated that Hyundai could leverage it's existing strategic partnership with General Motors to potentially use up some of thr capacity at CAMI, but that seems highly unlikely at this time. Instead, the focus now isnt on securing commitment but exploring ideas.

One of those, evidently is Hydrogen. Commerical Hydrogen has been a thing for a while, and a major interest of the previous Trudeau Liberals. However, recent times has seen a bit of a cooling on Canadian Hydrogen. It's been a lot longer of a road to build up the industry than expected.

Add on some conflicting words from the federal government on the exportability of Hydrogen, as I hear, and you have a recipe for struggle. Despite that efforts remain ongoing. Canada and Germany had prebiously signed an MOU regarding Hydrogen export in 2022. This agreement originally envisioned export by 2025, howeber that timeline has been pushed back to at least 2027.

The EU also committed €200-million in new funding to supporting the transatlantic hydrogen supply chain just last week, matching a previous commitment from the Canadian government. There is work ongoing, especially out in BC where companies like HTEC continue to try and build out a local hydrogen supply chain, while in places like Edmonton setbacks are still coming even in the face of progress.

It's a volatile industry right now, one toung and struggling to find it's place. However that same volatility makes it a prime destination for companies like Hyundai, who might be hesitant to invest in traditional EV production to shift focus and take some risk without cutting into their core business.

Korea is also fairly big on Hydrogen. Hyundai Rotem has even proposed using Hydrogen in the future K3! It is a natural synergy to try and tap into that market while it's stile ripe for the developing, and where homegrown players are still small and undeveloped. I am still skeptical on Hydrogen. Except Hydrogen trains. They can die.

As of now this will likely satiated some Federal desire for automotive investment, depending on what exactly comes of the MOU and how committed everyone is. Of course we don't have it on hand, so our own ability to interpret is limited to what is said by thr Globe and Mail. Nevertheless, it will be a win for the Federal government, who is also in the midst of building out a proper automotive strategy.

Once that's released we shouls be able to get a big picture to what's going on. It's going to be hard for Team Korea to compete directly with ongoing German investments like in St. Thomas, where the feds are pushing for additional investment. That is existing investment already commited and building.

It's always going to be harder to compete with physical infrastructure, especially to the scale of PowerCo. There is Korean investment, such as in NextStar, however my understanding is that there is no talks ongoing there at this time related to CPSP. We'll see how the German side does things, but for now the messaging seems to be one of hesitation from the likes of Volkswagen to commit more. Gotta wait and see I guess there.

I expect we'll hear more. The Koreans, shockingly, aint so talkative this time around. If you know anything about them the Korean companies lovw to talk. On top of this new MOU that no one is disvussing publicly there's also rumors that POSCO International has commited to investing in Torngat Metals Strange Lake project.

The Strange Lake project proposes an open-pit rare earth mine located in the Nunavik region of northern Quebec, near the Labrador border. Recognized as one of the world's largest deposits of "heavy" rare earths, the project specifically targets dysprosium and terbium, which are essential for the high-performance permanent magnets used in electric vehicle motors and wind turbines.

The project’s infrastructure plan includes a 170 km seasonal access road from the mine to a new port on the Labrador coast, with the ore ultimately being shipped to a dedicated separation plant in Sept-Îles, Quebec, to create a fully domestic North American supply chain.

As of early 2026, the project is advancing through critical environmental impact assessments and feasibility studies, backed by over $165 million in recent financing from the Canada Infrastructure Bank and other partners. Securing additional Korean investment would be massive for Canada’s proposed second Rare Earth mine. As fsr as I know the only other one right now is Nechalacho in the Northwest Territories.

It would also secure a second supply of critical rare-earth materials needed to support other proposed investments in fields like Energy and Automotive that Team Korea have been prioiritizing focus on. It would be proaxtive to try and secure not just an accessible source of mineral but also access to the potential refinement capabilities proposed.

Unlimitely, as of now, there is no word on this proposal deal other than that it exists, so it makes it hard to fully discuss what it entails. Until then? We can only speculate. It is something else to look out for though.

I expect over the next week that more and more will leak or be announced. I imagine that there is an incentive to slow-roll announcements over dumping a bunch on the media as was done on Monday. A delegation from TKMS is also in town, so I expect we'll hear more from them this week.

Until then!