Hyundai confirmed that it was in talks with Apple with regard to developing a self driving electric car this morning. However, it then released a revised statement talking about being contacted by various parties for the development of autonomous vehicles, but with any mention of the Cupertino tech giant removed.
Hyundai Motor Co shares were up over 20 per cent in the wake of the initial statement, and even though the release has been subsequently scrubbed to remove references to Apple, the shares are holding around the 20 per cent up level at the time of writing. In other words it sounds like Apple reprimanded Hyundai for publicising this business negotiation but the cat is now out of the bag.
The initial statement was that "Apple and Hyundai are in discussion, but as it is at early stage, nothing has been decided". Enough to spark Hyundai's sharpest ever intraday trading gain since 1988, noted MarketWatch.
Apple is notoriously secretive about its business dealing and developments but Bloomberg talked to insiders, who would rather not be named, who confirmed that it is indeed working on an autonomous EV which is in the early stages of development. It will need at least another five years for Apple's EV plans to come to fruition, reckon the sources.
The Apple car has been a long time coming. The last time we reported upon it was back in 2016, but never expected to be reporting in 2021 that it could take another five years until something is consumer-ready.
Hyundai was last in the HEXUS news two years ago today. At the time it grabbed headlines due to its car design which could walk "in mammalian and reptilian style". Another interesting development involving Hyundai recently didn't make the HEXUS headlines though – it bought Boston Dynamics for nearly US$1 billion last month.
