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Apple in talks with luxury carmaker McLaren
- Overtonwindow 10y agoThis has to be a total rumor. There's absolutely zero reason for Apple to buy the whole car company. I could see them buying a smaller manufacturer, but McLaren? Really? I just don't see it.
- freehunter 10y agoThere are smaller manufacturers than McLaren?
- jackfrodo 10y agoPaywalled.
- sspiff 10y agoClock web below the topic title, then click the first result.
- CodeSheikh 10y agoPaywalled. Updated: click "WEB" under the article.
- uptown 10y agoclick "WEB" under the article.
- cypherpunks01 10y agoNice! When did this feature come out?
- dan1234 10y agoOver a year ago. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10223645 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10223645
- sspiff 10y agoClock web below the topic title, then click the first result.
- uptown 10y ago"McLaren produced 1654 vehicles last year." If they're looking to use them for production, it seems like they may be following the early-days Tesla model for volume of vehicle production: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_Roadster#Production https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_Roadster#Production
- chadgeidel 10y agoNo offense, but hand-building supercars is not at all like starting up a large scale automotive firm. Yes, Tesla was hand building roadsters early on, but the intent (and the market) was completely different.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- aembleton 10y ago- Add refcontrol[1] for Firefox, or some alternative for Chrome. - RefControl > Options > Add Site - Enter site as www.ft.com and Action as https://www.google.com https://www.google.com You can also use this trick for wsj.com and probably a few other sites. 1. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-GB/firefox/addon/refcontrol/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-GB/firefox/addon/refcontrol/
- ttam 10y agohere's a TC link https://techcrunch.com/2016/09/21/apple-is-in-talks-with-mclaren-for-a-potential-acquisition-report-says/ https://techcrunch.com/2016/09/21/apple-is-in-talks-with-mcl... btw, "The FT thinks this acquisition could cost between $1.3 billion and $2 billion" anyone else thinking "wow, that's actually cheap"?
- sailfast 10y agoIt's not necessarily cheap for a small, bespoke company that loses money, but this would be money that Apple could find in its Irish subsidiary's couch cushions and they bring a lot of engineering expertise that could be applied outside of automotives especially with aluminum and carbon fiber. If I'm Apple then maybe I do it just because Jony Ive would think it was cool? haha
- doikor 10y agoMcLaren Technology group (the main parent) and McLaren Automotive are making a profit though. Yes they aren't doing all that well but still actually making money. Though hard to say what kind of a black hole the racing side (Formula 1) is at the moment for the company with the rather terrible results in the last few years.
- wastedhours 10y agoYeah, I knew McLaren Automotive wasn't driving profit at the moment (and cars are capital intensive), but to think such a brand with all of the resources that they have is worth half a Beats does shock me a little bit. Considering the amount of cash they have (and be interesting to see which locale they'd take it from), would say it's almost a no-brainer to acquire a foothold in the market with such prestige, awesome tech and talent. Plus, their respective histories with regard to secrecy and alignment of brands would make sense.
- Crespyl 10y agoIs half a Beats just one Beat?
- dustinupdyke 10y agoGordon Murray designs some pretty atypical vehicles, from the McLaren F1 to the T.25 or T.27 microcars, to the recent shippable truck. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McLaren_F1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McLaren_F1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T.25 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T.25 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Vehicle_Trust https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Vehicle_Trust
- jdavis703 10y agoSo the T.25 will be the iPod shuffle of electric cars? Or will they make the F1 their Apple Watch? Or maybe both?
- sangnoir 10y ago> Gordon Murray designs some pretty atypical vehicles You don't say! One thing is for sure: he really, really, really loves the idea of a central driving position. All the cars you mentioned have the driver sit smack bang in the middle.
- freehunter 10y agoIt's gotta be cheaper to make one car that can be driven on either side of the road than make a car for the UK and then another one for the rest of the world.
- poooogles 10y agoJapan and Aus(/NZ?) are also in that minor group!
- freehunter 10y agoAn excellent correction. I knew there were more but I was too lazy to look them up.
- beardyw 10y agoNot mention India (population 1.3 billion). All in all one third of the world drives on the left. I read somewhere that a lot of major manufacturers make about 50% of each.
- shmerl 10y agoOh, should we expect aggressive patent trolling to spill into car making now? While Tesla are opening up their patents, guess what Apple will do.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- dsl 10y agoApple has approached McLaren Technology Group, the British supercar engineer and Formula One team owner, about a potential acquisition, in the clearest sign yet that the iPhone maker is seeking to transform the automotive industry. The California technology group, which has been working on a self-driving electric vehicle for more than two years, is considering a full takeover of McLaren or a strategic investment, according to three people briefed on the negotiations who said talks started several months ago. A tie-up with McLaren, whose expertise ranges from automotive engineering and on-board computer systems to novel chassis materials such as carbon fibre and aluminium, could accelerate Apple’s secretive automotive project. Apple and McLaren declined to comment. The lossmaking automotive group was likely to be valued at between £1bn and £1.5bn, the people said, adding that it was not clear a deal would be done. That would make it Apple’s biggest acquisition since the $3bn purchase of Beats Electronics, the audio group founded by Dr Dre and Jimmy Iovine, in 2014. Earlier this year, Apple invested $1bn in Didi Chuxing, the Chinese ride-hailing company. That deal was Apple’s largest equity investment to date, as chief executive Tim Cook gradually breaks with the Silicon Valley company’s longstanding aversion to large deals. McLaren produces luxury sports cars that can cost as much as $1m apiece and owns an advanced technologies group, as well as the eponymous Formula One racing team. The owners of McLaren Technology control 80 per cent of McLaren Automotive. It produced 1,654 vehicles last year, generating revenues of £450m, and has pledged to invest £1bn in the next six years on research and development. McLaren Technology reported revenues of £265m and pre-tax losses of £22.6m in 2014, its last published accounts. It is owned by Ron Dennis, its chairman, Mansour Ojjeh, and Mumtalakat, Bahrain's sovereign wealth fund. Apple’s interest in the Woking-based company centres on its technology, engineering prowess and patent portfolio, according to people briefed on the talks. However, those people cautioned that it was unclear if a deal would go ahead following a recent shift in Apple’s car strategy. Since 2014, Apple has built up a team of hundreds of engineers and designers to work on the electric car venture, including recruits from companies such as Tesla and Mercedes-Benz. Its original team leader, Steve Zadesky, left earlier this year, and Apple veteran Bob Mansfield took over the project. In recent weeks, dozens of employees have departed, people familiar with the changes have said, as Mr Mansfield refocuses Apple’s efforts on the underlying systems that would power a self-driving car rather than building an electrical vehicle itself. Despite recent reports of those changes, some Apple analysts have questioned whether the company would depart from its traditional strategy of controlling both the hardware and software in its products. Some investors have hoped that Apple would make a move on Tesla, the Silicon Valley electric carmaker led by Elon Musk. At its annual meeting last year, Apple shareholders peppered chief executive Tim Cook with questions about whether he planned to acquire Tesla, which he carefully sidestepped. Mr Cook has never publicly acknowledged Apple’s automotive project, but many of its top executives are car enthusiasts. Phil Schiller, Apple’s marketing chief, is said to own a McLaren, and Eddy Cue, its services head, sits on the board of Ferrari, while top designer Sir Jonathan Ive has expressed his fondness for Bentleys and Aston Martins.
- a_j_b 10y agoWouldn't be surprised if it had more to do with their expertise with carbon fibre than anything else. You're not going to find anyone with more expertise with that material than F1 teams.
- buro9 10y agoI suspect this too. I remember a top notch cycling company that produced carbon components working with Apple too for the same reason. My Google-fu failed me though, I could not find a reference to it and it was 5-7 years ago.
- arethuza 10y agoPagani have a separate company dedicated to carbon composite manufacturing and consulting - they came up with the "carbotanium" bonded carbon composites and titanium used in the Huayra: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbotanium https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbotanium https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pagani_Huayra https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pagani_Huayra Pagani make McLaren look mass market!
- stcredzero 10y agoCarbotanium is my favorite canobtanium. I wonder what McLaren can achieve when it puts its mind to reducing production costs?
- bwilliams18 10y agoThey've said before that they have proprietary techniques that allow them to produce the CF for their road cars at scale more affordably.
- stcredzero 10y agoCombine this with Tesla's acquisition of CF expertise, and I would wager that more CF is going to be used in electric vehicles in the near future, providing even greater range.
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- julianpye 10y agoIf this is about a new line of baby strollers, I am really interested :) (TIL they are two different companies, where I always thought it's a brilliant marketing idea)
- russnewcomer 10y agoApple has lots of cash in accounts outside the U.S. that it can't/won't repatriate for tax reasons. They want to get into the car space. McLaren (from this not-a-car-guy-perspective) seems to have a similar corporate cultural ethos to Apple, plus they are English and therefore fewer language/cultural issues integrating. Basically, I'd suspect half the reason that Apple is going this route because it's quicker and cheaper to use that overseas cash to acquire experience than it is to try to build it internally.
- chadgeidel 10y agoAlong with the corporate cultural ethos (Ron Dennis is very similar to Steve Jobs in his attention to detail and demands of his company), McLaren has a strong engineering culture and "consults" for many other companies. I agree it would be a good "culture fit".
- krona 10y agoMcLaren also consults and does R&D for the British Olympic cycling team, so it's not just cars we're talking about. In fact, I'd imagine the world class materials research and manufacturing that McLaren does is of massive interest to Apple (carbon fiber all the things!)
- sir-velo 10y agoCan you explain their contribution? In the Rio Olympics the british velodrome team used Cervelo bikes like every other top team. https://www.cervelo.com https://www.cervelo.com https://www.cervelo.com/en-ca/races-and-athletes/british-cycling https://www.cervelo.com/en-ca/races-and-athletes/british-cyc...
- krona 10y ago> Can you explain their contribution On the materials side there are things such as the resin the British team coats the bikes in is applied and manufactured by McLaren. I think the greatest contribution is probably the data analysis they provide the team during the events (for example, the british team bring their own cameras, sensors on everything that moves, etc.) . More info: http://www.mclaren.com/appliedtechnologies/case-study/uk-sport http://www.mclaren.com/appliedtechnologies/case-study/uk-spo...
- cwilkes 10y agoMaybe they want to make a laptop that opens like ^o^ and not like /o\
- Disruptive_Dave 10y agonot enough jokes on HN, imo. :)
- JBReefer 10y agoNo, a serious tone is what keeps us from being Reddit
- askafriend 10y agoWe have some cheeky humor here every now and then and my personal opinion is that it's completely fine, but it's usually made in tandem with a serious reply :)
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- spatulon 10y agoAs John Cleese pointed out (IIRC, as a followup to him making a brilliantly funny and loving eulogy to Graham Chapman - "Good riddance to him, the freeloading bastard, I hope he fries"), you can be serious without being solemn. See: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7487081 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7487081
- oldmanjay 10y agoYou certainly can. Far more often what occurs on the internet is that people are jokey and disruptive without bothering to be brilliantly funny, and we don't need much of that here at all.
- moogly 10y agoIf that is the only thing, then HN is in deep trouble.
- grandalf 10y agoDoes anyone have a sense of how much legacy automotive technology is valuable in bringing a new electric vehicle to market? The chassis on a Tesla looks like an aluminum box... quite unlike a typical car chassis.
- loceng 10y agoI imagine it's the brand name of McLaren, and their engineering and design culture that is what makes this an attractive acquisition.
- tech2 10y agoHandling, balance, engineering for structural rigidity, materials science, network effects (knowing who and how to deal with), aerodynamics, etc. Cars aren't built by standalone coach builders and haven't been for decades (unless you're Morgan... :) ). Relationships with a large number of third parties are likely par for the course these days. Just because the chassis is different doesn't mean the rest of the system gets thrown out the window (significantly changed, perhaps, but I spect there's a lot of knowledge that's still in play).
- ynniv 10y ago"Atypical" isn't atypical to McLaren: http://www.motortrend.com/news/mclaren-four-new-models/#2012-mclaren-mp4-12c-chassis-front-three-quarter-3 http://www.motortrend.com/news/mclaren-four-new-models/#2012...
- linksnapzz 10y agoAluminum monocoque construction has been done for production performance cars by various makes for better than twenty years now. Audi, Honda, Ferrari etc. I wonder where people get this idea that 100+ years of automotive engineering know-how is somehow invalidated by powering the car w/ a battery. "Legacy" indeed.
- grandalf 10y agoWell, I'd think that in terms of the overall complexity of the device, there would be a complexity ratio of roughly: 100:10:1 for gasoline engine: suspension: everything else.
- daviddumenil 10y agoPresumably this has been leaked to draw out competitive bids.
- jackgavigan 10y agoI always expected that Apple would make an automotive acquisition but I assumed it would be Lotus Cars. It'll be interesting to see whether the deal (assuming to goes through) includes the F1 team.
- zer0defex 10y agoWow. Just wow. If this happens, the game has just changed. Ron Dennis and Tim Cook. If you replaced Tim Cook's name with anyone else, I wouldn't believe it could ever work. Tim Cook though has already shown how awesome he can work with a manically focused leader driving vision and strategy. All of the sliding of Apple's quality since Job's passing, ceased in one brilliant strategic move. Bravo Tim Cook, bravo. I'd be shocked if Elon Musk didn't pee himself just a wee bit after hearing this news.
- CameronBanga 10y agoCan you name one Apple product that has decreased in quality since Steve passed? Apple's products today are of higher quality than they've ever been.
- zer0defex 10y agoCan you honestly say Apple products "just work" anymore?
- wodenokoto 10y agoMy iPhone I would crash when writing long emails in Japanese and took shitty pictures, my iPhone 6 writes emails in all languages and takes great pictures. I would choose an iPhone 6 over any Jobs era phone.
- waterphone 10y agoYes, I have virtually no issues ever with any of my Apple products, including ones I use hard and have done so for years.
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- jonknee 10y agoWell the Mac has been pretty much abandoned: http://buyersguide.macrumors.com/#Mac http://buyersguide.macrumors.com/#Mac
- sargun 10y agoHopefully this doesn't result in us getting McLaren Macbooks, a la Ferrari laptops (http://www.pcworld.com/article/186742/acer_ferrari_one_review.html http://www.pcworld.com/article/186742/acer_ferrari_one_revie...).
- youdontknowtho 10y agoMcLaren makes beautiful machines.
- bedhead 10y agoMan I bet it would be fun to be in the M&A/strategy group at Apple.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- Gravityloss 10y agoMcLaren has the istream concept, which is about making cars out of cheap but very light and stiff flat composite plates.
- runesoerensen 10y agoMcLaren said in a statement to The Verge that the company "is not in discussion with Apple in respect of any potential investment". http://www.theverge.com/2016/9/21/13000666/apple-mclaren-acquisition-deal-autonomous-cars http://www.theverge.com/2016/9/21/13000666/apple-mclaren-acq...
- ceejayoz 10y agoThe way corporate PR works, that could mean the discussions are over and it's a done deal.
- sigmar 10y agoIt could also mean that the discussions are ongoing but McLaren doesn't want to lose their bargaining power by admitting the possibility. Their PR is under no obligation to be 100% honest and won't be if it is not in the company's financial interest.
- cpeterso 10y agoOr they are splitting hairs between "investment" and "acquisition".
- freehunter 10y agoOr it could be that Apple isn't looking to "invest" but rather to completely take over or even just buy some of their tech. Is it still an "investment" if Apple owns 100% of the stock?
- rtpg 10y agois McLaren public? If so, having a false PR can be slightly illegal in some jurisdictions
- neilc 10y agoMcLaren is privately held. BTW, I'm curious which jurisdictions you're referring to.
- joshu 10y agoCarbon fiber MacBooks? iOS based IRIS?
- Animats 10y agoMcLauren is one of the companies that builds good prototype cars for others. If Apple wants to fool around in the car space, McLauren can build them some demos.
- Cshelton 10y agoAs a huge Formula 1 fan, this would be very exciting! Pending Apple would keep McLaren in Formula 1. It would bring a huge amount of money to the sport along with another team that can compete at the R&D level of Mercedes and Ferrari.
- mikekij 10y agoFirst order of business: replace the fuel filling hole with a proprietary interface.