Apple or the acquisition of car company Canoo promotes car-making projects. For Apple, which has been calling for "building cars" for more than a decade, perhaps the acquisition of Canoo is not new to Apple. Apple or acquire the car company Canoo to promote the car-making project.
The rumor that Apple will build a car or acquire the car company Canoo to promote the car-building project 1 has been circulating for a long time. Now it is reported that Apple will acquire the electric car startup Canoo to further enhance its development in this field.
It is reported that Apple has great dreams about its upcoming entry into the automobile industry, and the first generation of cars may appear in the form of autonomous driving, ultra-high-end or both. Now, according to the whistleblower, Apple intends to absorb another startup in the field of electric vehicles and become a leader in the industry.
Canoo's goal is to launch the first generation of cars with a price of $40,000 or less by the end of 2022, similar to the SUV style.
However, regarding the source of funds, it is reported that Apple wants to use the engineers of this startup as new employees to expand its existing electric vehicle division.
As early as a long time ago, Apple negotiated with California electric vehicle startup Canoo to secretly promote its own electric vehicle project. There was a lot of news about Apple's car project before, including the possibility of cooperating with Hyundai Kia of South Korea to develop a platform, and there were rumors that it would cooperate with Foxconn to build a car, but Apple officials never responded positively.
Apple or the acquisition of car company Canoo promotes car-making project 2 Apple has never stopped entering the automobile industry, and this time it has an "anecdote" with "Canoo".
Recently, it is reported that Apple will acquire Canoo, a startup company of electric vehicles, to further enhance its development in this field and become a leader in this industry, and the first generation of cars may appear in the form of autonomous driving, ultra-high-end or both.
Surprisingly, unlike previous car companies, Kano is not well-known, so how did this seemingly insignificant startup attract the attention of this "first" company with global market value?
The founder is Faraday's future executive.
When it comes to Canoo, we can't help but mention the name of Jia Yueting, the founder of LeTV and the future founder of Faraday.
Canoo's predecessor is Evelozcity, and its founders are two former executives of Faraday Future (FF), Stefan Krause and Ulrich Kran. Around 20 17, they had a disagreement with Jia Yueting, and then left to start the new company.
Ulrich Crane.
It is worth mentioning that, according to the data, Crantz was also the general manager of BMW I project, who was fully responsible for the design, research and development, production and other work of I series products, and BMW i3, i8 and other products were obtained under his leadership. He is even known as "the father of BMW I project". Similarly, Klaus has more than 30 years of executive work experience in the financial and automotive fields.
Originally, for FF, the joining of the two is the icing on the cake. I never thought that at that time, FF filed a complaint and brought them to court.
The cause of the incident was that they had a disagreement with Jia Yueting at that time, and claimed that the company could not get financing because of Jia Yueting. Then they left and founded Evelozcity. The resignation of corporate executives is nothing new. However, according to FF's complaint letter, two former executives illegally stole a large number of core trade secrets and technical secrets.
At that time, FF pointed out in the letter that the extensive mission statement on Evelozcity website founded by Crantz, namely "designing, developing and delivering the next generation of the most competitive, functional, networked and clean mobile devices", was evidence that the new company intended to "directly compete with Faraday in the future".
The letter also pointed out that it includes auto parts plans, material specifications, cost lists, financial statements, information about Faraday's future patent VPA system, confidential power transmission system information, supplier information, and many other types of confidential information and special trade secrets. In addition, thousands of Faraday's most sensitive electronic files in the future were copied and stolen from FF's computers and servers.
Although this matter was later dropped, there was no follow-up information. But obviously Klaus and Crantz rely on FF to bring a lot of technical support to the creation of Evelozcity. Then it was renamed Canoo on March 25th, 20th19th.
Stefan Klaus
Kano's initial goal was to make lovely egg-shaped electric vans and pickup trucks. It is said that in 20 19, Kano raised 1 100 million US dollars in China to release a pure electric truck Kano, so as to enter the US and China markets. According to the plan at that time, the car will be produced in limited quantities in 20021year and in full production in 2023. Electric trucks start at $33,000.
Subsequently, Canoo merged with Hennessy Capital Acquisition Corp. IV (HCAC), a special purpose acquisition company, in June 5438+February 2020, and was listed on NASDAQ, with the trading codes of GOEV and GOEVW, at that time, the valuation exceeded 2 billion US dollars.
Two years after listing, the development of the enterprise is in jeopardy.
After the brief scenery, I thought it was a good starting point, but I didn't expect the crisis to come quietly.
According to the data, in March of 20021year, Canoo and Hyundai Motor Company of Korea jointly developed an electric vehicle platform. In April, 20021,co-founder Crantz left his job and joined Apple, which was another heavy hammer for Kano, who was already restless.
Then, from the end of 20021to the beginning of 2022, a small wave of resignation broke out in Kano, and more than 50 people, including grass-roots employees, left their jobs. Executives who have left successively include chief designer Mike de Jung, vehicle project leader Nicolas Leblanc and software control director Richard Walker. According to people familiar with the matter, Steven ooft, head of powertrain and battery manufacturing engineering, will also leave his post.
Recently, the Securities and Exchange Commission of the United States also proposed a draft legislation for special purpose acquisition companies, aiming at strengthening the information disclosure level of such entities and deleting a key legal exemption clause. If implemented, it will make it more difficult for special purpose acquisition companies to raise funds from investors and conduct mergers and acquisitions. This is undoubtedly "worse" for Kano, who is in the whirlpool.
According to the financial report submitted by Canoo, the operating loss of Canoo in the first quarter of 2022 was $65.438+$400 million, an increase of $97.07 million over the same period last year. So far, there is no income. As of March 3rd, 2022, Canoo had cash and cash equivalents of105 million USD, restricted cash of 3.45 million USD, assets and equipment of 224 million USD and total assets of 420 million USD. The management of the company also expressed concern about the company's ability to continue to operate.
Therefore, negative events such as high-level resignation, partner accidents and project stagnation have directly led to the break of Kano's capital chain. Some insiders analyzed that the shortage of capital chain led to the failure of card slave business and the failure of automobile production, which directly led to the failure of automobile delivery. Therefore, the precarious Kano needs a chance.
It is also at this time that Apple has been seeking to expand its territory in the field of new energy vehicles. For Apple, which has been calling for "building a car" for more than ten years, after many personnel changes and many failures in cooperation with automobile manufacturers, Apple's acquisition of Canoo may be a new life.
As mentioned above, Crantz, one of the co-founders of Canoo, left his job and chose to join Apple. I wonder if this has anything to do with the rumored acquisition.
However, some insiders pointed out that Apple wants to use the engineers of this startup company as new employees to expand its existing electric vehicle department and break through technical barriers. At the same time, Canoo needs Apple to provide sufficient funds to realize the normal operation of the business. This is a mutually beneficial choice for both parties.
However, it remains to be seen whether the rumor is true or not for Apple, which has just "built a car behind closed doors" and "asked three questions and didn't know three things".
Apple or Acquires Canoo to Promote Car Building Project 3 According to Bloomberg News, Apple is considering acquiring Canoo, an American electric vehicle startup, to promote Apple's car building project.
It is reported that Canoo, an electric vehicle startup, announced last week that it may not have enough cash flow to maintain its operations. In addition to cash flow difficulties, Canoo also said that this year's capacity target may not be completed as scheduled. In the face of the current business difficulties, foreign media analysis Kano is likely to find potential buyers.
▲ Kano's lifestyle car
Apple is a very likely buyer-Apple's automotive business department has acquired companies such as Drive.ai to develop its own autonomous driving business. Apple had similar cooperation and consultation with Canoo two years ago. In addition, Ulrich Kranz, former CEO of Canoo, is now one of the top managers of Apple's automobile project, and Apple also has some former Canoo engineers.
Despite the twists and turns of Apple's car-making project and many negative news, at present, Apple's car-making project is still going on, and after acquiring a new car-making company like Kano, Apple will make up for the departure of many important executives, and at the same time, with the help of Kano's accumulated experience in the new car-making track, it will add another fire to its car-making project.
I considered the acquisition two years ago, and talent is the most important consideration.
In fact, two years ago, Apple and Kano had discussed various ideas from investment to acquisition.
According to insiders of Apple Auto Project, Apple Auto's current development project is somewhat similar to Canoo's products, and Apple is not interested in the basic technology of this startup. But Canoo's engineers and other talents are Apple's valued assets, because Canoo employees have professional knowledge in automobile interior and exterior decoration, software, automobile manufacturing, transmission system, battery technology and other automobile parts.
▲ Kanu's life style in the car
At present, Canoo has developed a bottom car platform, which can be applied to different types of vehicles. Canoo's goal is to launch a lifestyle car at the end of 2022, and the price is less than 40,000 US dollars (about 270,000 yuan). This car looks like a minivan, but it has a back seat similar to a luxury car.
Kano was founded on 20 17. The founding team is a group of people from Faraday Future, an electric vehicle startup, including several former BMW executives. Cano plans to produce commercial electric vehicles, such as delivery trucks or food trucks, and a consumer-centric truck, which will be sold by order. All vehicles of Canoo will be manufactured based on its extensible electric vehicle platform.
According to people familiar with the matter, Canoo's scalable electric vehicle platform is also the main reason for attracting Apple. Canoo's platform is different from that developed by other start-ups and large automobile manufacturers, because it integrates more automotive electronic devices and has greater flexibility in cockpit design. The platform also uses steer-by-wire technology, which also increases the flexibility of automobile design, but it has not been widely used in the industry at present.
Acquired related companies many times, and recruited people from many car companies this year.
In fact, when Apple starts to develop an important new product, it usually uses acquisitions to expand its strength. For example, iPhone's multi-touch interface, Siri, Apple Music, Face ID, Touch ID, Apple Maps and even macOS are all the results of Apple's enhanced R&D strength after acquiring many companies in the industry.
Apple's future electric cars are no exception. At present, some basic capabilities that Apple needs in autonomous driving and machine learning are basically due to the company's acquisitions in the field of artificial intelligence in the past few years. In 20 19, apple acquired Drive.ai to develop autonomous driving technology. At present, some engineers and managers of the original Drive.ai are now the core figures of the Apple car project in terms of car operating system and autopilot software.
▲ Apple self-driving test car
In recent months, after the departure of several executives, Apple has also started a new round of recruitment from automotive companies such as Ford, Rivian, Tesla, BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Volvo and Waymo.
There is still a lot of uncertainty about Apple's car.
Although the industry is full of expectations for Apple cars, if Apple's research and development can't keep up with the plan, the car-making plan is likely to stop across the board. According to Apple's vision, fully automatic driving is one of the key capabilities of Apple Car. However, judging from Apple's autopilot test results, its level is not the top in the industry.
At the beginning of this year, major autopilot test companies submitted 202 1 annual test reports to California DMV, and Apple was among them. Among them, the total mileage of Apple's autopilot test ranked 14, and MPD (average mileage per trip) was 20.02 miles (about 32km), ranking 22nd. Judging from the results, it is slightly mediocre, and there is still a clear gap with the head players who are more active in testing, such as Waymo, Cruise and Ma Xiao Zhixing. Not even an order of magnitude.
2022 may be a crucial year for Apple. In the context of a large number of executives leaving, the shape of the car is uncertain, and even the results of the autopilot test are relatively mediocre, there is still great uncertainty in Apple's car making. So we can see that Apple wants to acquire many new car-making companies like Kano by spending money to gain new development paths.