Still threatened by swelling rivers and backwaters. Global news 24 hours a day powered by more than 2600 journalists and analysts in more than 120 countries. Im mark crumpton, this is bloomberg. Bloomerg west is next. Emily im emily chang and this is bloomerg west. Ford ceo mark fields tells us what he is focusing on a driverless car and doubling down in silicon valley. Tim cook spending for survival in china. The apple chief ballast to invest even more in one of its most challenging markets. Google fires a shot at apple, facebook in the mobile messaging wars. Is it too late to catch up to some of the most popular apps in the world . D pulls back the curtains on his ambitions and autonomous driving saying is developing a fully Autonomous Vehicle for right hailing services in 2021. It would have no steering wheel. One of the last major automakers joining the push to automated driving. We are party scene types between tm and that, toyota and uber. Now for disappearing up with bidu, both investing 75 million into a start up making the technology that helps cars understand their environment. It is doubling down its headcount at the Palo Alto Research facility. But ford has not struck a partnership with one of the big ft forps like uber or ly apple or google. I cut up with mark fields and began by asking what he considers partnering with a major tech player mark as we look at the technology and the roadmaps, there are things that others do better than we do. We are open to partnering. Four new partners. Emily tesla is focused on i semiautonomous model. There is a Safety Investigation going on into one of their crashes in which someone died. Using autopilot you are focused on fully autonomous. Your carbon not even have a steering wheel. Why is that the best way . Mark i cant speak for tesla. We are a leader in what we call level 02 driverless features. Stopping you in traffic. We will continue to be a leader and continue to invest. At level 4 we have a lot of confidence and we believe in our plan that taking the driver out of the loop is important because this little no mans land of what point did you have to reengage the driver and a level 3 vehicle. We are struggling with understanding how do you do that responsibly and timely for the driver. Emily someday, once you get your cars on the road, a Ford Self Driving car will be in an accident. It will be rare but it will happen. When that happens who is liable . Mark we have to have a discussion with the regulators, the consumer advocate groups, insurance companies, etc. This is one of the areas where we will have to Work Together to come up with good policies, both regulatory policies and legal policies. Emily one of the investments is with bidu. I spoke to the head of the self driving car unit there who says they want cars in the road by 2021 as well. Will this investment help you get for self driving cars on the road and china in china . The next series of investment for valentine. We were not partners with bidu, they are just one of the financial partners. I wouldnt read anything more into that. Our china strategy is a Good Business in china. It is growing. As we think about Mobility Solutions there we are thinking about how do we play a role in that in addition to our core business. Emily specifically on the fully versus semiautonomous thing, do you think, and i know you will not speak to tesla specifically, but do you think he said my autonomous model can be dangerous . Is it unsafe . Mark we struggle with it. When you think about a level 3 vehicle, how do you reengage the driver in a timely way . That is we have struggled with that. That is why we have made the decision to only go to a certain level of semiautonomous features, and they just say we were go from a for a fully autonomous. The tragedy in ohio or pennsylvania or florida, benjamin from ohio or wherever emily he was not from florida but it was in florida. Mark those are some of our concerns. That is why we have taken the path we have taken. We just beat to what we are doing. Emily when it comes to working with a platform like google or apple, do you struggle with the idea of giving up that much control the someone else . Important a potent Going Forward with two controls the relationship with the customer. It depends on how that is structured. Emily how do you see this playing out . This is a hotly competitive area of the market. We have talked about so many deals and partnerships. Do you see ford coming out . Mark i feel really good about buttechnical capabilities, i feel good about how we are approaching this in talking with others and being realistic about what things we can do well and what things we cant and who do we need a partner with to realize our business. Emily do you need to invest in lyft or is gm getting ahead of themselves . Mark i can only speak to our strategy. Our focus is getting a fully Autonomous Vehicle on the road. We look at everything through the lens of what is going to create longhair longterm shareholder value. Whether its our core business or emerging business. Emily teddy drove one of the cars . Mark it is have you been driven . It is fun to drive the core vehicles and it is fun to be driven. It is really fantastic. You get used to it very quickly. Even notice after a while if youre having a conversation with somebody in the car. Emily ford motors ceo mark fields. Here with me to discuss more about cars and tech is alex webb. What you make of what he said . Been of the reaction has other Companies Striking big deals and this is still small potatoes. Alex on one hand you have the investment in technology which allows you to do the autonomous driving and the ridesharing. The thing we have seen, the big competitors, they invested in technology and form of cruise automation. Reportedly as much as 1 billion or less. Then they have also invested in ridesharing companies. They sunk 500 million in two lyft l into lyft. Ford is focused on the technology to do in Autonomous Vehicle. Clearly all these big ridesharing companys are burning to cash at a precipitous pace. Perhaps maybe that the reason they dont want to get into it yet. When it comes to read these things are starting to make money and turn big profits, ford will have to have a look around. Emily he said its really important to figure out who holds the keys to the customers, who controls the relationship with the customer. I sensed a bit of hesitance and working with apple or google or any of these other players. Partsone of the big announced said the are going to provide some vehicles to google. Saideo was sensitive and we are not just going to be bashing metal for google to get all the value creation. Methinks the gentleman doth protest too much. Is an softwareon which is highly profitable that comes from google or apple. And the lowmargin building of cars is done by the classic oem. Emily but Fiat Chrysler is doing the deal. Fiat the difference is doesnt have the cash reserves and the ability to raise debt as readily as ordered or general motors. It is hard to through a huge amount of money in research and development. Wed is backing itself and can have the cash to go into the space of a want to. How many players are there of any significant scale in the ridesharing space . All of these guys now have Big Investments from carmakers. Has forward missed the boat ford missed the boat . It is a possibility. Emily a story out of china. Apple making opening a big new r d facility in china according to an email statement from tim cook who is in beijing. He didnt specify the offices location or how many employees itre would be, but cut says will bring together engineers from some of its existing centers in the region. Apple has more than doubled its number of corporate sites in china to 45. Its spending has quadrupled. Marketslot of emerging have a lot of quid pro quo stuff. You invest in our economy, you bring jobs here, you can bring factories here and research and development here, we will give you greater access to the market. This is i dont think a colossal investment. Its a lot of a lot consolidating of existing sites. It is another notch on the list of saying we are helping you,. He was a favor emily how many times has he been there in the last year . Or india . Alex india is the next on the list, the real target. We will see how it goes when new iphone comes later this year. India is the next one on the target list. Emily tim cook is getting some stamps on his passport. Alex, thank you so much. Later we will continue our look at the transformation of the auto sector. We will hear from black lane, the latest german carmaker winbooking start of two when an investment from daimler. That is next. This is bloomberg. Emily india has a new internet unicorn. Hi messenger just raised more than one and 75 million from big tech backers. That pushes its valuation of the newly 1. 4 billion. Its users send 40 billion messages a month. The new funds will be put towards investment in ai, Machine Learning and augmented reality. And tencenthatsapp we chat dominate. Google has struggled to come up with its own messaging hit. Today we learned it will try again with a new video chat app called duo. Its closest to apples facetime but fits into a collocated line of of mediation tool from alpha that alphabetic. Obviously google wins a lot of things. By a they trying to do this . Out on the missing primary mode of communication which is messaging platforms. If you look at the number of people on this platform it is more than 1. 6 billion and growing. Google is lacking into the monetization potential of this massive audience because more and more services will eventually converge into these messaging platforms. Facebook and snapchat and the younger audience might take the cake and google is missing out. Emily android and ios. If i had an iphone why would i use this . Facetime is so easy. Jitendra thats a big question for every user. There are features that are a little different. You can see the calling as soon as you call, you can see the other person and stuff like that. Those things, if they catch on, apple can replicate. Facebook messenger or snapchat can have that. It will be a big uphill battle. Emily facebook and some of these asian messaging companies have a huge head start. How optimistic are you that google will be able to catch up . Jitendra if you look at the history of google trying to close the social network gap, that did not go well. There was this dilemma. At some point it will come up again. Ifn the airich features, that catches on, facebook will not be that far behind. They already have the audience in the engagement. In between the two platforms you have one billion people in each one of them and growing. This will be an uphill battle and google will have to face the dilemma of should we buy or build. Emily what is the monetization potential of video chat apps like this for google . How much money can they make . Jitendra its just about the messaging platform. Eventually they converge. Now they have two different ones. Probably the strategy is if one of them catches on, they can integrate the other and get the audience on board. Facebook basically is in its early legs. They are trying to increase traction with businesses. Once the organic interaction increases, they will monitor rise. Monitor rise. It is just the tip of the iceberg. Emily we will be watching to see of one or both catch on. They do so much. Thank you so much. Univision is said to be buying gawker media for 135 million. This according to reuters. Univision was one of two bidders, with davis taking a formal offer for gawker. It was driven into bankruptcy in june after losing a highprofile lawsuit from hulk hogan, who we found it was backed by peter thiel. Airbnb has a zero chance of reaching a high level chance of success there. This is bloomberg. Emily kaiser lee has been a driving force in chinese tech is former head of google china and Microsoft Research in asia. He is targeting early stage, its in china. I sat down with him from exclusive interview and thought asked what he thought of the recent uber deal. It was a win win for both of them. They could have taken more time to eliminate goober, but that wouldve taken too long. Emily how does it impact other u. S. Startups and the sharing economy business, like airbnb which is trying hard to break into china and looking for a chinese ceo . I think looking for chinese ceo is the smart move. That is something uber never did and it is a huge problem for any American Company operating in china. Airbnb is smart to look for a chinese ceo. Its business is culturally different to be run in china. I think most of their efforts are trying to get Chinese Tourists to stay in airbnb abroad, which is ok. But if they wanted, and built an american like franchise, i think the user base, the habits of where people stay and the expectations on people who lease out space and people who try to rent space are very different. They will be in for a culture shock. Is if this market were sent have what the copycat become a 10 billion Company Already . Emily what do you think the odds are of airbnb succeeding in china where others have failed . Airbnb if youre asking how likely will they become an applelevel of success in china, i would say zero. Emily what about less than apple, like an airbnb level of success in the u. S. . That is also zero. Typeey want an uber opportunity they probably have a shot. Emily obviously facebook is still blocked in china, twitter is still blocked in china. What is the likelihood of those Companies Ever being unblocked in china . Almost notit is relevant for those companies anymore because even if they were accessible, user habits are very well formed. Chat andve using we others. I think there is no chance users would migrate to their Services Even if they were available. Emily how about google . You know this better than almost anyone. Googles own struggles in china. Do you see google every coming back to the covenant ever coming back to the country . They will have to try a little harder than the other companies because of the way it chose to leave. Google has a very diversified line of products. I think it has an opportunity to take the least sensitive products to try to land in china. Maybe something that is hardwarerelated and doesnt have to do with social networks, and user data or censorship. Emily what about the Search Engine . Search engine will be a little difficult. Google pledged not to do censorship. That will make it difficult to enter for the time being. Emily lets talk about the reverse. Wechat has had Great Success in china but difficulty entering the u. S. Market. They have 700 million users. What is a likelihood they will be able to make the reverse happen and break into the United States . I think also pretty low. There are a few notable exceptions, but i would these them as exceptions. The best test for Chinese Companies that want to go abroad are to go to the countries that are similar to china. That is countries that are becoming wealthier, developing countries with large populations, highly dense cities, young people who want to try new things. Countries like india, indonesia, brazil. Even the middle east. If i were a chinese entrepreneur deciding to go abroad, those of the countries i would focus on. Not the United States. Emily we will have more that exclusive conversation next, including how he handles a pr crisis as former head of google china. Check us out on the radio. You can listen on the Bloomberg Radio app, bloomberg. Com and on serious xm. This is bloomberg. Mark you are watching bloomberg west. Lets begin with a check of your news. U. S. Warplanes pounded Islamic States last stronghold in libya today. The attacks bring the number of u. S. Military airstrikes against the Extremist Group to 48. The u. S. Began his campaign on august 1. Russian warplanes used a base in iran to attack Islamic State and other rebels in the syrian city of aleppo. Last week russian resident Vladimir Putin discussed the fight with iran leader. The European AviationSafety Agency is calling for tougher medical exams for pilots. The group wants results from drug and alcohol screenings included in Mental Health assessments. Last year a german pilot with a history of depression crest an airplane into the french alps, killing all wanted or 50 people on board. 150 people on board. Guzman may el chapo have been kidnapped. The state attorney general says he was presumed to be among the kidnapped men. Experts say he assumes control of parts of his fathers business after guzman was rearrested in january. Global news 24 hours a day powered by more than 2600 journalists and analysts in more than 120 countries. I am mark crumpton. This is bloomberg. It is just after 6 30 p. M. Paul allen has a look at the markets. Paul good morning. 30 minutes on wednesday morning so far and already looking pretty good. Of two thirds of 1 . With respect to see some positivity on the nikkei today, but a flat start in australia. The big one to watch locally will be bhp. Shares rose. 7 and the london trade overnight despite a net loss of nearly 6. 4 billion, its worst ever. The market agrees that the worst is probably over. A lot of earnings out today. Secondquarter earnings. Their first announcement since the 8. 6 billion acquisition of super cell and cap a specific out of hong kong reporting earnings. Net income may be down for cafe by 46 . The airline hit by a fuel hedge loss and possible new landing fees and hong kong as well. That is the fund the new airport expansion in hong kong. A quick look at china. A further example of opening markets. The shenzhen hong kong stock connect. I am paul allen for bloomberg tv in sydney, australia. Emily this is bloomerg west. He is one of the leading voices in chinas tech community. Kaifu lee. E ceo i asked him what his company is betting on. Kaifu we are focused on several