Comes from Korea betrothed chosen by Apple to ferry Apple, with a liquidity of 192 billion dollars, into the world of four wheels. It's about Hyundai, the Korean giant which, together with its subsidiary Kia, is in fifth place overall among the manufacturers and is already well positioned among the groups active in the electric sector and a pioneer in hydrogen.
The news of his contact with Apple exploded on January 8 after the rumors of Hankyung tv, a broadcaster linked to theeconomic daily, the leading financial newspaper. A few hours after the confirmation, through gritted teeth, that the house (at the time suspected among the possible buyers of Fiat Chrysler) "is one of Apple's interlocutors”. “But the talks – held back from Seoul – also concern other producers. And we are just at the beginning”.
So much caution didn't prevent that Hyundai's stock took off with a leap of 24%, enthusiasm which is justified by the wait for the landing of the Apple in an apparently very crowded market which, given the technological discontinuity that characterizes the sector, seems ready to welcome a new competitor with financial means and great skills to spend in self-driving cars. It is no coincidence that Volkswagen's number one, Herbert Diess, has just sounded the alarm. “In a few years – he said with a note of exaggeration – the sure protagonists of the challenge will be Tesla and Apple. We hope to be there."
In reality, the contents of the are not yet clear iCar project. Hyundai's choice indicates that Apple has decided to set aside the idea of entrusting production to a third party by limiting its contribution to the design phase. The breakthrough coincided with the arrival of Doug Field in the company, one of the great protagonists of the birth of the Tesla 3, much appreciated for the technical solutions brought to the project. "But based on the conversations we had with the company - explains Dan Ives, Wedbush analyst - we were convinced that Apple was aiming for collaboration with a manufacturer already in the field rather than wasting energy as has already happened on the occasion of the shelved project in 2014”. At this point the Asian track, already well known to Apple for the experience accumulated with Foxconn (which is developing its own project with the contribution of Fiat Chrysler) was the most obvious choice.
Apple has discarded the Chinese solution, either for political reasons or because Beijing is already a leader in the electric sector (more a competitor than a partner) as well as an almost irreplaceable strategic supplier: the auto industry, which for now is behind mobile in the ranking of chip customers , has been suffering in recent weeks from delivery delays from Korea and Taiwan. Furthermore Hyundai has considerable experience in alliances: in 2019 it invested 2 billion dollars in Motionl, a joint venture on robot taxis with the supplier Aptiv and announced its intention to put by 2025 over 90 billion dollars in the service of electric mobility.
