Hyundai Supplies 11 County EV Buses for Bali Transit Pilot
Hyundai Motor has supplied 11 County EV bus platforms for Bali’s first electric public-transport pilot. Local manufacturer Laksana completed the bodies, creating 20-seat midsize buses that the project plans to monitor as they enter service.
Hyundai announced the delivery on October 23, 2026, one day after the Bali Sustainable Transportation System project held its launch ceremony. The company says the fleet is part of an official-development-assistance program led by the Global Green Growth Institute, with South Korea’s Ministry of Climate, Energy and Environment and the Indonesian government.
This is a fleet deployment, not a passenger-car launch, but it is a concrete step in Indonesia’s commercial-vehicle electrification. Hyundai supplied the rolling platforms; Indonesian coachbuilder Laksana built the bodies. That division of work matters because it combines an imported electric-bus platform with local vehicle manufacturing and support.
What Hyundai delivered
- Fleet: 11 Hyundai County EV buses
- Vehicle size: approximately 8 meters long
- Passenger layout: 20 seats in the Bali configuration
- Battery: 128 kWh
- Claimed range: more than 200 kilometers, or about 124 miles, per full charge
- Body manufacturer: Laksana of Indonesia
Those figures come from Hyundai’s October 23 announcement. The company did not publish the buses’ charging power, route assignments, daily mileage, fare structure or a firm date for full passenger operations. It also did not specify whether the range figure uses a standardized test cycle or reflects an operating estimate, so it should not be treated as a guaranteed real-world result.
A pilot with operating support
Hyundai says it will run an EV Bus Field Quality Assurance Program during the initial deployment. That support includes a local “situation room” to monitor vehicle quality and driving performance as the buses begin service. The arrangement makes the program more than a handover ceremony: the first operating period is intended to generate service data and identify problems.
A GGGI transportation report published in August also describes a pilot using 11 Hyundai eight-meter County EV units under Indonesia’s buy-the-service model. Under that approach, public authorities purchase a defined level of transit service from an operator rather than simply buying buses and leaving the operating plan unresolved.
The report and Hyundai’s release align on the fleet size and vehicle type. Hyundai adds that it was selected after a GGGI-led tender in the second half of 2025, following a memorandum of understanding between the South Korean and Indonesian governments.
Why Bali is a meaningful test
Bali’s traffic patterns combine dense urban areas, tourism demand and trips between activity centers. A midsize bus can be easier to place on constrained streets than a full-size transit bus, while a 128-kWh battery is smaller than packs used in many 12-meter electric buses. Whether the more-than-200-kilometer claim is enough will depend on the selected routes, air-conditioning load, traffic, passenger weight, terrain and charging schedule.
The program’s immediate scale is modest. Eleven buses will not transform island-wide transport, and Hyundai has not quantified expected emissions reductions. The useful test will be whether the fleet can maintain scheduled service in Bali’s climate while local teams handle charging, maintenance and parts support.
Hyundai has previous experience with the same number of County EV buses in Indonesia. The company supplied 11 units for public transport in Surabaya in November 2024. It now says it is considering further electrified-commercial-vehicle business in Jakarta, Semarang, Surabaya and Medan, although no additional contracts were announced with the Bali delivery.
Commercial EVs are a separate market
Electric buses face a different adoption test than passenger EVs. Fleet operators can plan routes and depot charging, but they also need predictable uptime, trained technicians and parts availability. The Bali project’s monitoring program directly addresses those operational questions.
The broader market context is also different from Europe’s passenger-car shift. Battery-electric cars recently moved ahead of petrol in European Union registrations, while Indonesia is still building local supply chains and operating models for electric public transport. Hyundai’s partnership with Laksana is one route toward that localization.
For Hyundai, the announcement is evidence of a regional commercial-vehicle push rather than proof of a large order pipeline. The next useful facts will be the routes, charging infrastructure, service start, reliability results and any follow-on fleet purchases.
What to watch next
Readers should look for confirmation that all 11 buses have entered scheduled passenger service, details of the charging network and results from the field-quality program. Until those are published, the project is best understood as a small, government-supported pilot with delivered hardware—not a completed conversion of Bali’s bus network.
Featured image: A Hyundai County EV with an E-Nucleus 5 body by Laksana at the 2025 Gaikindo Jakarta Auto Week. Archive/illustrative image; it shows the same vehicle type and Indonesian bodybuilder, not one of the 11 Bali pilot buses. Photo by Sulthan Naufal via Wikimedia Commons, licensed under CC BY 4.0.
