Automakers Prospect Apple, Google as partners and adversaries

GENEVA — Automotive executives are taking seriously the prospect that Apple and Google will emerge as competitors even as they consider partnering with the two.

"If these two companies intend to solely produce electric vehicles, it could go fast," Volkswagen Chief Executive Officer Martin Winterkorn said at the Geneva International Motor Show. "We are also very interested in the technologies of Google and Apple, and I think that we, as the Volkswagen company, can bring together the digital and mobile world."

 

On the first day of the Geneva Motor Show, Europe’s annual lovefest for the automobile, German luxury car maker Audi rolled out a souped-up electric sports car called the R8 that demonstrates why vehicle executives think they can withstand an onslaught by Silicon Valley that threatens to upend the 129-year-old industry.

Apple's foray into cars follows a path it's taken to break into other industries. The company wasn't the first to make a digital-music player or smartphone, and only entered those markets once it had a compelling product. Google says it's seeking partners to help realize co-founder Sergey Brin's vision of safer and more efficient mobility.

 

And while car manufacturers see Google and Apple as potential competitors, they also view them as partners to advance their own technology. A number of automakers last year signed on for Google's Open Automotive Alliance to bring the Android operating platform to cars.

"The key element is to make sure that when we're working with them -- and we're totally open to work with any of them -- it's a real win-win," said Didier Leroy, Toyota Motor Corp.'s European chief. "The carmakers don't want just to become a kind of commodity, where somebody will only deliver an empty box and somebody will put in the box something which will be the real added value."