Hyundai Motor's two R&D vice chairmen offer to resign - sources

By Hyunjoo Jin

SEOUL (Reuters) - Hyundai Motor Group's two vice chairmen in charge of research and development (R&D) have offered to resign, three people familiar with the matter told Reuters on Tuesday.

R&D president Albert Biermann is likely to be named chief of the division, two of them added, declining to be named as they are not authorized to speak to media.

The reshuffle is one of the most high-profile shake-ups since Hyundai promoted heir-apparent Euisun Chung in September to executive vice chairman, moving him a step closer to succeeding his octogenarian father as head of the country's second-largest group.

The South Korean group has since appointed new heads of product strategy and design, and created two entities to develop future technologies, as it battles plunging profits and sagging share prices.

The latest shake-up at the group, which includes Hyundai Motor and its affiliate Kia Motors, is likely to be announced on Wednesday and is part of a sweeping management reshuffle at the group, one of the sources said.

A Hyundai Motor spokesman declined to comment.

The group's vice chairmen, Yang Woong-chul and Kwon Moon-sik, both aged 64, told senior officials at its R&D centre on Tuesday that they would leave the company, the sources said.

Biermann, a former BMW performance vehicle development official, adds to a flurry of foreign executives that Chung, 48, has brought in to the company typically dominated by Koreans.

In October, Thomas Schemera, also a former BMW executive, was appointed to lead product planning for autonomous cars, connected and electrified vehicles, while Luc Donckerwolke, a former Bentley design chief, was named design division lead.

The reshuffle is "part of a generational change Chung is pushing for", said the source quoted earlier.

(Reporting by Hyunjoo Jin, additional reporting by Ju-min Park and Heekyong Yang; Editing by Himani Sarkar)