Hyundai Motor Co and its affiliate Kia Motors Corp said that they are not in talks with Apple Inc to develop an autonomous vehicle, responding to intense speculation about the potential new product by the maker of the iPhone.
Apple paused discussions with Hyundai and Kia weeks ago about building an electric vehicle (EV), people familiar with the matter told Bloomberg late last week.
Apple has discussed similar plans with other automakers, the people said, asking not to be identified as the information is not public.
Photo: Reuters
The South Korean automakers also said in regulatory filings yesterday they were in talks with multiple companies about autonomous EVs, but that no decision has been made.
Shares of Hyundai, which said discussions with partners were in early stages, fell as much as 8.4 percent in Seoul, while Kia slumped 14 percent.
“Talks with Apple ending isn’t going to dampen Hyundai’s strategy because the automaker already has set up plans on its EV business with the Ioniq brand,” said Lee Jae-il, an analyst at Eugene Investment & Securities Co in Seoul. “There’s still possibility for Hyundai and Kia to cooperate with other automakers for its EV platform.”
Hyundai has recently developed a new EV-dedicated platform, and plans to build 23 models on it, beginning with the Ioniq 5 next month in Europe, followed by a Kia marque later this year.
EVs made on the platform would be able to charge up to 80 percent capacity in 18 minutes and add as much as 100km of driving range in just five. They will have a top range of 500km on a single charge.
A report from Nikkei Shimbun last week said Apple is in talks with at least six automakers for the development of its EV, while Dow Jones said Kia had approached potential partners about a plan to assemble Apple’s electric vehicle in Georgia.
Like many big tech companies that are working on connected and intelligent mobility solutions, Apple likely needs to partner with an automobile manufacturer. Setting up an auto car plant can cost billions of dollars and take many years.
An Apple car would rival EVs from Tesla Inc, as well as offerings from upstarts like Nio Inc (蔚來汽車), Li Auto Inc (理想汽車) and Lucid Motors Inc, and established players such as Daimler AG and Volkswagen AG.
EV sales are booming in Europe, reaching a record high last year and this year is expected to mark yet another period of growth, supported by a string of new models.
China is already the world’s largest EV market, with deliveries rising almost 10 percent last year to 1.11 million units, China Passenger Car Association data showed last month.
BloombergNEF forecasts that adoption of EVs would accelerate in the 2030s, and by 2050, about 65 percent of all passenger-vehicle kilometers traveled would be electric.
By 2050, EVs would account for 73 percent of all new car sales globally and there would be about 800 million passenger EVs on the roads out of a total passenger-
vehicle fleet of 1.5 billion.
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