New Delhi, June 27, 2008: The all new compact Hyundai i10 - the most awarded car of 2008 - has a new association now, as it encourages schoolchildren across India to ‘Sketch the i’- an educational program aimed at creating safer drivers in the future by targeting today’s school children. The country’s fastest growing auto manufacturer and leading innovator today announced that it would organise a series of school meets where students would be encouraged to present imaginative and interesting ideas on Road Safety.

On from 16th June, the program will continue till the 3rd Week of August, and will be organized at 3 levels – the school level, the city level and finally the all India competition. The final round of the competition will culminate in a national competition at Chennai in August 2008.

Through this program Hyundai aims to contact a total of 140,000 students targeting 250 schools in 14 different cities - Delhi, Lucknow, Chandigarh, Jaipur, Indore, Mumbai, Pune, Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Guwahati and Cochin.

“Hyundai is committed to providing communities with the resources they need to create safer traffic environments on local streets. Through this program, we aim to educate children on road safety, and we hope they will be safer in the future, whether they are drivers or pedestrians,” said H S Lheem, Managing Director, Hyundai Motor India Ltd.

He further added, “The association with school children is all about innovation and ideas and given that road safety is a prime concern for us at Hyundai, it followed naturally that we should link the two. We are always looking for ideas on how to boost road safety and where better to look than among the youngsters, who are the most imaginative.”

While the three submissions adjudged the best at the national competition will get the winning participants the opportunity to visit the Hyundai plant in Korea, all 52 participants in the national competition will be awarded a prize of Rs 10,000. Winners of city-wide competitions will be presented Rs 1,000 as prize money. Five of the best presentations from each of the 245 schools will be taken to city-wide competitions, from where three winning entries will be sent to the national competition at Chennai.

Hyundai has long supported the cause of road safety and is involved in running the student traffic volunteer scheme in the cities of Delhi and Chennai which will expand to include other metros in the coming months. This concept too links safety and environment together and is a step further in the cause of spreading awareness about these two issue.

About HMIL
Hyundai Motor India Limited (HMIL) is a wholly owned subsidiary of Hyundai Motor Company, South Korea and is the second largest and the fastest growing car manufacturer in India. HMIL presently markets 30 variants of passenger cars across segments. The Santro in the B segment, the Getz Prime and the i10 in the B+ segment, the Accent and the Verna in the C segment, the Sonata Embera in the E segment and the Tucson in the SUV segment.

Hyundai Motor India, continuing its tradition of being the fastest growing passenger car manufacturer, registering total sales of 327,160 vehicles in the calendar year (CY) 2007, an increase of 9.2 percent over CY 2006. In the domestic market it clocked a growth of 7.6 percent as compared to 2006 with 200,412 units, while overseas sales grew by 11.8 percent, with exports of 126,748 units.

HMIL’s fully integrated state-of-the-art manufacturing plant near Chennai boasts of the most advanced production, quality and testing capabilities in the country. In continuation of its commitment to provide the Indian customer with global technology, HMIL has set up its second plant, which produces an additional 300,000 units per annum, raising HMIL’s total production capacity to 600,000 units per annum.

HMIL is investing to expand capacity in line with its positioning as HMC’s global export hub for compact cars. Apart from expansion of production capacity, HMIL plans to expand its dealer network, which will be increased from 230 to 300 this year.

The year 2007 has been a significant year for Hyundai Motor India. It achieved a significant milestone by rolling out the fastest 400,000th export car. Hyundai exports to over 90 countries globally; even as it plans to continue its thrust in existing export markets, it is gearing up to step up its foray into new markets. The year just ended also saw Hyundai Motor India attaining other milestones with the launch of the i10 and yet another path-breaking record in its young journey by rolling out the fastest 1,500,000th car.

Hyundai’s new model i10 which made its global debut here in India in October, 2007 made a clean sweep of all the ‘Car of the Year 2008’ awards from the leading automotive magazines and TV channels like BS Motoring, CNBC-TV18 AutoCar, NDTV Profit Car & Bike India and Overdrive magazine. The i10 is also the choice of the discerning automotive media of the country as they conferred the prestigious ‘Indian Car of the Year’ (ICOTY) award to the i10 as well. The i10 bagged these awards on the basis of excellence in build quality, handling, driver comfort, safety and ride quality.

The Santro and the Accent also received the ‘TNS Voice of the Customer - 2008’ award for the Premium Compact Car (Santro) and the Entry Mid size Car (Accent). In March 2008 it achieved yet another milestone by rolling out the fastest 500,000th export car.

Last year, the Hyundai Verna bagged some of the most prestigious awards starting with the title of "Car of the Year 2007" by India`s leading automotive publication – Overdrive, the “Best Mid-size Car of the Year” award by the NDTV Profit Car & Bike India Awards 2007, the “Best Value for Money Car” by the CNBC Autocar Auto awards and ‘Performance Car of the Year 2007’ from Business Standard Motoring.

Hyundai cars have been a favorite at all awards ceremonies and have always been winning awards. Our models like Sonata Embera won the ‘Executive Car of The Year 2006’ award from Business Standard Motoring Magazine and NDTV Profit Car & Bike India declared the Tucson as the ‘SUV of The Year 2006’. Not only this, HMIL has also been awarded the benchmark ISO 14001 certification for its sustainable environment management practices.