Hyundai Motor Company is a South Korean company headquartered in Seoul that specializes in the production of passenger cars. The Hyundai Group of Companies was founded by Chung Joo Yong in 1947 as a diversified family company that produced steel, machine tools, locomotives, electronics, construction and petrochemicals. The holding included dozens of companies. In 1967, the company began to master the direction of the automotive industry, forming a division of the Hyundai Motor Company and organizing the assembly of cars under the Ford brand. By 1980, the concern was producing up to 50,000 cars a year. In 1998, Hyundai acquired the Korean car manufacturer Kia Motors. In 2000, the company entered into a strategic alliance with DaimlerChrysler, which existed for several years. The company is currently part of the Hyundai Kia Automotive Group. Hyundai Motor Company also owns a number of car plants in South Korea (including the world's largest car plant in Ulsan, which consists of 5 enterprises), North America, China, India, the Czech Republic and Ukraine. The company is the largest automaker in the country and the fourth largest in the world