China s electric-car makers are paying top-dollar rents to open showrooms in luxury malls as they seek an edge in the hypercompetitive market. More than half the malls in Shanghai have at least one electric-vehicle showroom and more are planned, according to real-estate servi rovider Jones Lang LaSalle Inc. They are now part of the standard configuration of shopping centr es in medium-to-large cities, the firm said in a recent report. With dozens of EV makers in various stages of development jockeying for a slice of what is the world s largest EV market, upstart brands like Nio Inc. and Xpeng Inc., and the new-energy arms of SAIC Motor Corp. and Geely Automobile Holdings Ltd., are staking out ground in malls to burnish their image as premium goods for the middle class and differentiate themselves from more established automakers. Rents for a 200- to 300-square-metre showroom in prime areas of China s biggest cities run to around US$1 million a year, according to JLL.
Published March 04. 2021 11:05PM
By Debby Wu, River Davis, Gabrielle Coppola and Kyunghee Park, Bloomberg News
Apple Inc.’s work on a car has brought to the fore several potential manufacturing partners capable of building an electric self-driving vehicle for the technology giant.
The secret project has gained momentum in recent months, adding multiple former Tesla Inc. executives, gaining the supervision of Apple’s top artificial intelligence executive and ramping up road tests. The initiative, known as Project Titan inside Apple, is attracting intense interest because of its potential to upend the automotive industry and supply chains, much like the iPhone did to the smartphone market.
The Day - Who will build the Apple Car? Here are candidates to watch - News from southeastern Connecticut theday.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from theday.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
EVs to be assembled like smartphones: Hon Hai
MULTI-USE: The arrangement of seats in future vehicles would be different, allowing passengers to do everything they do at home, the CEO of the firm’s EV platform said
Staff writer, with CNA
Electric vehicles (EVs) developed on a Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) platform would be built like “a smartphone on a different platform,” Jack Cheng (鄭顯聰), chief executive officer of the Hon Hai-initiated MIH Open Platform Alliance, said on Saturday.
It would be the ultimate goal to make vehicles built on the platform an extension of the driver’s home, he said during an online presentation.
In October, Foxconn introduced its first-ever EV chassis and software platform, and has two light vehicles and a bus planned for around the fourth quarter.