Government and company policy for promoting electric vehicle

MasterElectric Vehicle and Plug-in Hybrid Vehicle are being launched globally and will grow rapidly considering the current environmental problem and limited oil resources. However, electric vehicle market growth is hampered by many factors such as high price and poor charging infrastructure. Therefore, Government needs to actively promote the purchase of these vehicles and establishment of the charging infrastructure.Currently Japan, Germany and the U.S. lead the global auto industry but nobody can guarantee that they will be the leader of the electric vehicle era. China is investing heavily in electric vehicle R&D and Denmark is leading the charging infrastructure R&D in order to dominate the market. Thus, Korean government needs to provide an active support for research and development of electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles to accelerate development and become competitive in the world market.The change to the electric vehicle may be compared to the change to smart phone. Every stakeholder has to prepare electric vehicle era because otherwise they will suffer hardship like LG electronics did in smart phone market. Electric vehicle is emerged due to energy problem and tightened environment regulations, transforming the auto industry. Korea already has the world-level technology for the battery and IT. Therefore, the electric vehicle area can be a growth engine for the Korean economy along with the semiconductor and display industry, if government and related companies make a concerted effort together