A wholly owned subsidiary of Hyundai Motor Company of South Korea, Hyundai Motors India Limited was formed in May 6, 1996. They are the second largest automobile manufacturer in India after Maruti Suzuki. The initial years for Hyundai India was the toughest time they have had witnessed so far.Hyundai was practically invisible in India at that time, because at that moment, the passenger car market was dominated by Maruti Suzuki and no one had even the slightest bit of chance to intrude in their dominion. But then, to everyone's surprise came Hyundai's first runaway success with the launch of Hyundai Santro on 23 September 1998. It was the Hyundai Santro which made Hyundai Motors India Limited the second largest automobile manufacturer and the largest automobile exporter in India under the passenger car category.

Initially there was only one manufacturing plant but then in order to fulfil the rising demands for its products Hyundai Motors India Limited commissioned a second plant in February 2008 which itself is capable of producing 300000 units per annum. So, currently there are two manufacturing plants in Sriperumbudur, Tamil Nadu which in total are capable of producing 600000 vehicles annually. Hyundai is also famous for its full fledged, integrated and most advanced state-of-the-art plant. It has a network of 307 dealer and 627 service points almost all over India. Hyundai is currently manufacturing under five types of categories. Under A2 category there is Hyundai Santro, Hyundai i10, Hyundai i20; under A3 category there are Hyundai Accent and Hyundai Verna; under A5 category there is Hyundai Sonata Transform and under the last category there is Hyundai Santa Fe SUV. Irrespective of the fact that Hyundai is the second largest passenger car manufacturer in India, it seems that they are aspiring for even more as with the launch of six vehicles lined up in 2011 Hyundai expect this upcoming year to be a perfect opportunity to expand its horizons.