Hyosung Heavy Industries (298040.KS) is building a production system for ultra-high-voltage circuit breakers in the United States in partnership with a North American firm. It marks the first time a Korean company has secured production bases in the U.S. for both ultra-high-voltage transformers and ultra-high-voltage breakers.
Hyosung Heavy Industries said Tuesday that its U.S. subsidiary Hyosung HICO has signed an agreement with a subsidiary of Quanta, a North American energy infrastructure solutions company, to establish a gas circuit breaker (GCB) joint venture named "Hyosung HICO BREAKER, LLC."
The joint venture will be established in July and begin producing ultra-high-voltage breakers ranging from 72.5 kilovolts (kV) to 800 kV in October at Quanta's Canonsburg plant in Pennsylvania. The two companies will expand the scope of their cooperation to areas such as direct current solutions and data centers in the future.
Hyosung Heavy Industries explained that the joint venture is intended to respond to demand from the expansion of artificial intelligence (AI) data centers in the U.S. and the modernization of aging power grids. Quanta is the largest local power and energy infrastructure engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) firm, with a broad business base and customer network across the U.S.
Hyosung Heavy Industries has become the first Korean power equipment company to secure both transformer and breaker production capacity in the United States. In particular, the joint venture is known to be an achievement made by Hyosung Group Chairman Cho Hyun-joon, who personally traveled back and forth to the U.S. Cho met with Quanta's chief executive officer (CEO) and other key executives locally in March to reach a final agreement.
"The two companies have already built a strong partnership, continuing cooperation from supplying breakers and substation equipment to transmission and renewable energy integration projects," Cho said. "We will draw out synergies between the U.S. corporation's operational know-how and the joint venture to firmly establish ourselves as a 'total solution provider' in the U.S. power market."
Hyosung Heavy Industries has posted a series of achievements, including signing a contract earlier this year to supply ultra-high-voltage transformers and other equipment worth 787 billion won—the largest among Korean power equipment companies—to a U.S. transmission grid operator. According to Global Market Insights (GMI), the North American breaker market is forecast to grow at an average annual rate of 6.7%, from $4.8 billion in 2024 to $9.6 billion in 2034.
