GM declares’the end of internal combustion’
Hyundai Motors is targeting the US and China
Target 10% of EV market share
Photo = EPA
General Motors (GM), the largest automobile company in the United States with a history of 113 years, declared the end of the internal combustion engine at the end of last month. It announced that it will stop producing gasoline (gasoline) and diesel (diesel) vehicles by 2035, and convert all models except heavy trucks to electric vehicles. GM Chairman and CEO Mary Bara said, “We will create a world where carbon emissions, traffic accidents, and traffic jams are all’zero’.”
Global automakers are accelerating the transition to eco-friendly vehicles against Tesla, the’electric vehicle kingdom’. Information technology (IT) companies such as Apple and Google are also engaged in a joint venture with automakers with’soft power’.
Electric vehicle switching at speed
Volkswagen sold more than 220,000 electric vehicles last year. Although it was less than half of Tesla’s (about 500,000 units), it set a goal of selling 1 million electric vehicles, five times more in 2023, two years later. In addition, it is a strategy to turn into a complete electric vehicle company by launching 75 types of electric vehicles by 2029. German premium automakers such as Mercedes-Benz and BMW are also planning to significantly increase the proportion of electric vehicle sales in the future.
From 2030, Hyundai Motor Company will gradually increase the proportion of electric vehicles in key markets such as Europe, China and the United States. Through this, the goal is to expand its market share in the global electric vehicle market to 8-10% by 2040.
Chinese electric car makers”bee attacks’ are also fierce. Wei Lai (NIO), Xiaofeng, and Lixiang, which are called electric car start-ups, all increased 4-5 times last month compared to the same period last year. Wei Lai has lowered the price of the vehicle through a battery rental method, and Xiaofeng is putting out a differentiation strategy such as introducing a free charging service.
IT companies such as Apple also participated
Car makers are not the only ones shouting’Tesla’. It is reported that Apple is in contact with major automakers with the goal of releasing self-driving electric vehicles by 2024. The Apple car, which will become the so-called’wheeled iPhone’, is expected to make a lot of waves in the automobile industry. Apple has developed’Apple CarPlay’, which allows you to move the iPhone display to the vehicle screen and enjoy it, and has already installed it in millions of vehicles. Apple’s strengths include software competitiveness and strong component procurement capabilities. CNBC broadcast said, “The Apple i-car will have a significant impact on the Tesla electric car.”
Sony is regarded as one of the fastest developing electric vehicles among IT companies. At the recently held world’s largest IT and home appliance exhibition’CES 2021′, the driving video of the electric vehicle Vision S prototype was also released. Vision S is the first self-driving electric car model that Sony unveiled last year, and it incorporates Sony’s technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI), communication, and entertainment. As Google and Amazon are also strengthening their mobility business, some analysis suggests that’Google Car’ and’Amazon Car’ may be released in the future.
AI semiconductor development competition
IT companies are also strengthening the AI semiconductor business, which is a key component of self-driving electric vehicles. US semiconductor company Nvidia acquired a semiconductor design company ARM for $40 billion from Softbank in Japan in September. This is to increase the competitiveness of not only mobile semiconductors, but also autonomous driving and AI technologies.
In 2017, Intel acquired Mobileye, an autonomous driving sensor company, for $15.3 billion, and in 2019, it bought Havana Labs, an Israeli AI semiconductor company, for $2 billion. In addition, last year, it is reinforcing the future car business by taking over the map and mobility service provider Moovit.
Ho-jung Lee, a senior research fellow at the Automobile Industry Research Institute, said, “As the uncertainty about growth (due to Tesla’s success) decreases, IT companies are actively jumping into the electric car market. It can lead to disruptive changes in the industry.”
Reporter Ahn Jung-rak [email protected]