Kia launches pilot of remote-driven PV5 car-sharing in Korea

On Thursday, in Pangyo, in Gyeonggi Province, a PV5 electric van began its first trip as a shared car with nobody at the wheel. Kia has launched a pilot programme in South Korea that asks a simple question: what if the car came to you, and a person far away drove it there? The pilot began operating this week and will run until the end of the year. Kia says it is the first service of its kind in South Korea to use remote driving technology.

The mechanics are simple to describe. Users reserve a vehicle through a dedicated app. The van then drives itself to the requested location, with no one on board, while a remote driver steers it through the 4G or 5G wireless networks. Once the user has finished, they park it where they choose, and a remote driver moves the van back to its garage over the same connection. A remote driver operates the vehicle from a distance.

The pilot builds on earlier steps. Kia received a special exemption for the remote driving regulatory sandbox from the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport last April. In November 2025 it formed a Remote Driving Consortium with Socar, KT and the autonomous driving startup SUM, and showed what it called Korea's first remote driving demonstration on public roads by a domestic brand. In July, Kia signed an MOU with KT and SUM to push the technology towards commercialisation, with a stated aim of launching the service within a year.

For this pilot, Kia, SUM, Mobiops and the Korea Road Traffic Authority form the consortium. Kia supplies the vans and oversees the project. SUM develops the remote driving software, Mobiops runs the service, and the Korea Road Traffic Authority handles regulatory reviews. Gyeonggi Province, KT, UMOS ONE, the Next Generation Convergence Technology Research Institute and the Gyeonggi Automobile Rental Business Association support the project as partners.

What changes, and for whom? Kia's argument is aimed at businesses, which could reduce the cost and hassle of owning a fleet, and at users who can pick up and drop off the van wherever they choose. The pilot does not yet answer those questions at scale. Its stated purpose is to verify the remote driving technology and the feasibility of running the service under real-world conditions, and to use the data gathered to keep improving it. Kia plans to expand the service in 2027, using the data gathered during the trial. The sources do not give the number of vehicles involved, pricing, or the number of users.