What Stellantis wants to do with Foxconn and smart cars
Stellantis has signed an agreement with Foxconn to develop semiconductors for cars, which will also be offered to third-party companies. The automaker has unveiled its plans for connected and “smart” vehicles. All the details
After the lithium agreement with Vulcan Energy and the solid state battery agreement with Factorial Energy , the car manufacturer Stellantis has made a pact on another crucial component for new generation vehicles: semiconductors, or microchips.
The group has in fact signed a non-binding memorandum of understanding with Foxconn, a Taiwanese company of electronic components known mainly for assembling Apple's iPhones. The agreement aims, by the end of the year, at the creation of a partnership for the design of four families of semiconductors intended not only for Stellantis, but also available for third-party customers.
WHY FOXCONN
The choice of Foxconn as a partner is not accidental. First of all because the company is showing a great interest in the automotive sector: it wants to have its components or services installed in 10 percent of electric vehicles worldwide by 2025. Last February it announced that by the end of 2021 they would be released the first electric vehicles built from its hardware and software platform, called MIH.
Relations between Foxconn and Stellantis are already solid: in August the Italian-French manufacturer announced an agreement for the creation of a joint venture with FIH Mobile (part of the Foxconn group) for the development of smart vehicle interiors: that is to say, more specifically, entertainment-information software ( infotainment ), cloud computing systems, artificial intelligence applications, navigation and voice assist devices, and so on.
The name of this 50-50 joint venture is Mobile Drive. Even then, the intelligent interior solutions developed will not only be present on Stellantis vehicles, but also made available to third-party manufacturers.
There are not only electric cars in Stellantis' plans, therefore, but also “intelligent” and connected vehicles
THE PARTNERSHIP WITH FOXCONN
The semiconductors developed together with Foxconn will serve both to meet Stellantis' needs (more than 80 percent, the company claims) and to avoid new supply crises like the current one , and to supply other car manufacturers. In a note, Stellantis says it aims to "reduce the complexity" of microchips.
THE “SMART” OBJECTIVES OF STELLANTIS
Stellantis today, through CEO Carlos Tavares, also presented its long-term strategy on vehicle software. The goal is to generate annual revenues of € 4 billion by 2026 and € 20 billion by 2030 from these products.
The company expects to have 34 million connected vehicles on the road by 2030, up from 12 million today.
Starting in 2024, Stellantis will release three new open-source, AI-powered technology platforms called STLA Brain, STLA SmartCockpit (the cockpit is the passenger compartment) and STLA AutoDrive.
In addition to Foxconn, the company has entered into partnerships on new mobility technologies with BMW and Waymo (part of Alphabet, the parent company of Google).
WHAT VOLKSWAGEN, FORD AND RENAULT DO
Software is becoming increasingly important in the automotive industry: it will serve both to monitor electric vehicle engines and batteries (and manage related data), and to provide autonomous driving and passenger entertainment services.
Currently, the carmaker most forward in this regard is Tesla, while traditional manufacturers are trying to make up for the delays. In addition to Stellantis, Volkswagen plans to raise 1,200 billion euros from software sales to auto industry players by 2030.
Ford, on the other hand, has hired Doug Field, who used to do automotive services at Apple, to lead the division that will develop technologies for connected vehicles. Renault has partnered with Google on the design of infotainment systems.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/smartcity/stellantis-foxconn-semiconduttori-veicoli-connessi/ on Tue, 07 Dec 2021 11:53:20 +0000.