Hankook partners with Amazon Web Services and Snowflake in AI tyre development plans

Hankook Tire’s holding company (Hankook & Company) along with Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Snowflake are working on an integrated AI data platform to improve the performance and quality of tyres. According to the company, the digital ecosystem should also help to develop autonomous driving technology, increase efficiency in product development and increase quality through the analysis of manufacturing data.

Hankook says it wants to “firmly anchor data-based decisions in its corporate culture and increase the company’s value through the optimised availability of data”. The tyre maker also plans to expand digital development processes across the entire value chain by enabling employees to make small innovations in a system-based work environment.

To that end, Hankook & Company is collaborating with AWS and Snowflake to establish an optimised data analysis infrastructure, incorporating cloud-based solutions and platform expertise. (Snowflake, headquartered in Montana, USA, is a cloud-based SaaS software that helps efficiently store, process, and analyse large volumes of data). The project aims to build an integrated data analysis environment using the latest artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) technologies. The project will leverage AWS’s data lake environment and analysis infrastructure, including Sagemaker and AutoML, and have Snowflake as a data warehouse to promote cloud migration and digital transformation.

The cloud-based data analysis platform is home to both internal and external data – from Hankook’s research and development, production and quality evaluations as well as from sources such as mobility providers or Voice of Customer (VOC) surveys. The newly built platform is intended to become a tool to enhance tyre performance and quality. It will integrate and analyse data from performance tests and customer feedback for their electric vehicle tyres, the Hankook “iON” series, to improve their performance. In addition, the company will use integrated analysis of vehicle operation data and external data to develop autonomous driving technology.

Hankook & Company also aims to increase the efficiency of new product development and address quality issues through analysis of manufacturing data. The company, collectively and regardless of the locations of its subsidiaries and employees, will be able to utilise an integrated platform to freely access data, identify new business opportunities, achieve strategic goals, and enhance competitiveness through data exchange and technology collaboration with external companies.

Hankook & Company’s Chief Digital Officer (CDO) and Chief Information Officer (CIO), Seong-jin Kim, stated: “With the development of generative AI, AI is passing through an inflection point, there is a need for a platform that can collect and freely use internal and external data to apply it to businesses,” and that “by utilising the excellent technology and solutions of Amazon Web Services and Snowflake, we will maximise our AI capabilities and accelerate our journey to enhance product competitiveness in areas such as electric vehicle and smart tyres.”