“Samsung wants to ensure it’s as integral to the electric car world as it is to the mobile arena,” Devindra Hardawar reports for Engadget.
“The Korean electronics giant is acquiring Magna International’s battery pack arm, Magna Steyr, which will fit nicely inside of Samsung SDI, its component division. SDI has already scored a major deal with BMW providing batteries for its new i3 electric car and i8 hybrid, and it will make up eight percent of Tesla’s battery supply this year (it’s also in talks to build even more),” Hardawar reports. “Having more battery smarts, naturally, should make Samsung a stronger competitor to Panasonic, which is Tesla’s biggest suppler, as well as its partner for the massive ‘Gigafactory’ battery plant. You might also remember Magna as one of the companies Apple reportedly talked to for its rumored electric car project.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Par for the course.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “SJBMusic” for the heads up.]
Apple should just start floating all sorts of rumors about industries they’re planning on entering, and watch bemused as Samsung bankrupts itself “strategically acquiring” companies related to those industries.
It’d be like watching fish shoot themselves in a barrel.
Was my thought too.
Hmmm…
– I heard Apple was researching wind powered boats with a thermal backup system.
– I heard Apple was building personal rocket ships.
– and building carbon nano space elevators.
That should keep Scamscum busy for a while.
Samsung: Too little, too late.
My guess is Apple considers existing Lithium Ion batteries as “old tech” at this point. Apple already makes a large number of its own batteries which started with the iPod era where Apple needed custom flat pack batteries.
I fully expect Apple to come out in a 3-5 years with something like BASF’s advanced NiMH batteries noted on TechnologyReview.com this week.
I think that Apple might want to avoid a Lithium based solution if possible. There is a limited supply of Lithium and huge demand for it. If Apple were to make a car, it would be designed to sell in huge numbers, so where would all that Lithium keep coming from ? Supply and demand would make the raw materials very expensive and supply might be unreliable.
It’s for that reason that I think something like a hydrogen fuel cell would be a much more Apple-like solution.
I thought that was what they are doing with this car stuff. Been a big reworking of their PR Dept maybe this is their mission to feed and/or encourage such rumours to gain exposure and buy into some of this extensive, if I feel too often lowbrow and faddish tech promotion of the sort the likes of Goggle attracts. If so careful management is required so as to not look dumb when their efforts look like failures. A narrow line to tread.
Not so keen on BMW using what is now a Samsung battery.
There are probably a ton of products you use everyday which have Samsung parts in them, you just don’t know it. Like your iPhone’s processor may have been made by Samsung.
The processor no more made by Scamsung as the iPhone is made by Foxcom. Similarly Einstein theory of relativity printed by a printer is NOT the printers theory of relativity. It is still Einstein’s theory.
When will people realize this most basic of facts in the semiconductor business. We used to get our chips fabricated at TSMC. They were not TSMC chips.
The processor is no more made by Scamsung as the iPhone is made by Foxcon. Similarly Einstein theory of relativity printed by a printer is NOT the printers theory of relativity. It is still Einstein’s theory.
When will people realize this most basic of facts in the semiconductor business. We used to get our chips fabricated at TSMC. They were not TSMC chips.
Technically “fabricated by” is the same as “manufactured by” which is the same as “made by”. Get over yourself. It wasn’t designed by or engineered by samdung. That was the point.
And my point is ‘fabrication” is no big deal.
Let’s hope you remain true to your name.
YOU haven’t been around long, since you don’t know!
Like it or not, chip fabrication *is* a big deal. If it weren’t then Apple wouldn’t still be using Samsung to do some of it.
Next: Samsung replaces all of the metals they use in their products with that new alloy they keep hearing about…
Was it Aloo-mimium?
“It’d be like watching fish shoot themselves in a barrel.”
Hahahahaha!
Apple is developing diarrhea ointment. Maybe Samdung will invest in labs and manufacturing process for butt pain relief. 😉
Our early attempts at a tractor beam went through several preparations. Preparations A through G were a complete failure. But now, ladies and gentlemen, we finally have a working tractor beam, which we shall call… Preparation H. On the whole Preparation H feels good. 😉
Monkey see Mokey do
Seems to be a frenzy of activity in the battery space. Is there some kind of federal action/other that I should know about?
Despite Samsung’s scummy executive culture, they make world class electronic components. This is a good move by them to enhance their technical chops.
Seems to be a frenzy of activity in the battery space. Is there some kind of pending federal action/other that I should know about?
Ok, I use to get annoyed with Samsung.
Now, I am finding them quite amusing.
What pathetic, “me too” antics on their part. They are starting to make me laugh.
Remember that they are a chaebol conglomerate. Shipbuilding, refrigerators, phones, car batteries… It’s all the same.
soon they will find out those ‘Apple Vans’ driving around are actually prototypes of Dr Dre’s ‘Mobile Outdoor DJ service’.
Samsung needs to change their name to Samestuff or Mee-2 Industries. Gadfrey can a company be any more desperate or copy happy?
They don’t even know why they are buying this except to copy Apple.
If Apple bought cow manure Samsung would buy twice as much just because.
It doesn’t seem like a copy move to me. It seems like this is a move to be in the supplier side, not the carmaker side. You don’t think so?
Samsung Car.
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
Here come the exploding car batteries.