TOKYO (Reuters) – Nissan Motor Co Ltd said Monday it was not in talks with Apple Inc., following a report that the iPhone maker had approached the Japanese company in recent months about a link to its autonomous car project.
The Financial Times said the companies had short talks that faltered due to Nissan’s reluctance to become an assembler for Apple cars, adding that talks had not advanced to senior management.
“We are not in talks with Apple,” said a Nissan spokeswoman. “However, Nissan is always open to exploring partnerships and partnerships to accelerate the transformation of the industry.”
The spokesman declined to comment further. Apple representatives were not immediately available for comment.
Shares of Nissan were sharply lower on Monday afternoon trading, down 3.7% from a 1.4% increase for the Nikkei 225 benchmark.
Discussions in the early stages between Apple and Hyundai Motor Group about autonomous electric cars have recently collapsed due to the South Korean carmaker’s concerns about becoming a mere contract manufacturer.
Reuters reported in December that Apple is advancing with autonomous car technology and aims to produce a passenger vehicle that could include its own revolutionary battery technology as early as 2024.
Outsourcing the production of models through original equipment manufacturing (OEM) offers is common in the automotive industry, but the industry does not have a major contract manufacturer in the way Foxconn in Taiwan serves the consumer electronics industry.
This year, however, Chinese company Geely has announced a lot of links, including one with Foxconn and another with Chinese internet giant Baidu Inc., as it tries to position itself as a contract maker for electric cars in China.
Reporting by Eimi Yamamitsu in Tokyo, Nandakumar D and Kanishka Singh in Bengaluru; Edited by Edwina Gibbs