The world is changing and along with it the way businesses work. Enemies are becoming friends and old rivals are now joining forces to make sure that they can survive this sudden shift in priorities. BMW and Daimler have been rivals for ages but looking at how things are unveiling and the massive funds needed to invest in new-generation powertrains and platforms, they are apparently in talks of developing certain car components together.
This would be a premiere, without a doubt, at least if it becomes official. At the moment, neither of the two agreed to comment on the report which surfaced today according to Automotive News. The two automotive giants are already working together in certain fields, such as smart mobility endeavors or when they bought HERE maps.
According to the report, the collaboration would be limited to certain areas, such as technologies that are not brand-specific but no decision has been made so far. However, developing even some parts together would cut costs to allow funds to be invested in autonomous driving technology, which seems to be the main goal of every car maker out there. That’s not all though, as demand for electric cars is also on the rise and traditional car makers, such as BMW and Daimler need to keep up.
In today’s climate, other car makers are even thinking of mergers or are part of ‘hostile takeovers’. Mitsubishi was recently bought by the Renault-Nissan conglomerate while Volkswagen and Ford have been in talks for a full merge for quite some time now. And we’re talking about Volkswagen here, a company that owns brands like Audi, Seat, Skoda, Ducati, Porsche and many others and is considerably bigger than both BMW and Daimler, and even they consider they need to join forces with other car makers to keep up. A move like the one BMW and Daimler are reportedly negotiating could only help the two, in their quest to offer an alternative in the future and keep going.
