Hyundai’s empire began with one bold moo-ve and one missing cow
Published on Oct 21, 2025 at 9:18 AM (UTC+4)
by Jason Fan
Last updated on Oct 21, 2025 at 12:05 PM (UTC+4)
Edited by
Mason Jones
Hyundai founder Chung Ju-yung started his incredible journey with a dream, a daring escape, and strangely enough, a missing cow.
That cow, sold without permission, became the unlikely seed money for one of the world’s biggest car empires.
Today, Hyundai Motors is a global powerhouse.
But it all began with a restless farm boy who refused to let poverty or his father’s anger stop him.
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It took the Hyundai founder several attempts to get going
Born in 1915 in Tongchon, now part of North Korea, Chung Ju-yung grew up the eldest son of a poor farmer.
His father wanted him to take over the family fields.
But young Chung wanted more than muddy boots and endless chores.
He wanted to build something modern, which is something his future company is exceedingly good at.
At just 16, he made his first daring escape, trekking miles through valleys to find work.
His father dragged him home, but that didn’t stop him from trying again.
This time, he sold one of the family’s cows to buy a train ticket to Seoul.
After being caught again, he eventually made a final escape at age 18, determined never to look back.
In Seoul, Chung took whatever jobs he could find.
He worked in a rice shop, hauling heavy sacks through the city’s narrow streets.
His hard work finally paid off, as he quickly became the shop’s bookkeeper, before eventually becoming its owner.
He renamed it Kyungil Rice Shop and turned it into a thriving business, until Japan’s colonial policies crushed small enterprises like his.
Still, Chung didn’t give up. He opened a car repair garage that grew from 20 to 70 employees, before wartime regulations shut it down.
Making reparations for the missing cow
After Korea’s independence in 1946, he tried once more.
And this time, the world noticed.
He founded Hyundai, meaning ‘modernity’ in Korean, and began winning major construction and industrial contracts.
From building railways to manufacturing cars, his company’s reach grew far beyond Korea.
In 1998, long after achieving his dream, Chung Ju-yung decided to make amends for taking his father’s cow.
The Hyundai founder led 500 cows across the Korean Demilitarized Zone, as a heartfelt repayment for what he had to do.
Today, Hyundai Motor Group, which includes the Kia and Genesis brands — and electric models like the Ioniq line — sells cars in 193 countries through more than 5,000 dealerships.
The brand also recently had its best sales month ever in the US, selling over 71,000 vehicles in September.
Who would have thought that a missing cow would play such a key role in the establishment of one of the world’s most prominent automakers?
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Jason Fan is an experienced content creator who graduated from Nanyang Technological University in Singapore with a degree in communications. He then relocated to Australia during a millennial mid-life crisis. A fan of luxury travel and high-performance machines, he politely thanks chatbots just in case the AI apocalypse ever arrives. Jason covers a wide variety of topics, with a special focus on technology, planes and luxury.
