Frankfurt The sports car manufacturer Porsche is working more and more intensively with Apple. At the end of last year, the Porsche board of directors was in California. “We traditionally maintain a very close cooperation with Apple, also because we are on the same wavelength there,” said Porsche boss Oliver Blume on Friday in a question and answer session on the presentation of the balance sheet.
He announced: “We will expand Apple Car Play. We discussed a number of exciting projects with the Apple board of directors in California.” The topic will be supported and developed by Porsche Digital in Silicon Valley in Palo Alto. But it is still too early to talk about specific issues.
The statement is explosive. With CarPlay, Apple no longer wants to limit itself to the iPhone working smoothly via the car’s information and entertainment systems. In the future, CarPlay should also be able to access its own car functions such as seat control or cruise control. According to industry reports, the project with which Apple wants to penetrate deeper into the car is called “Iron Heart”.
Porsche CFO Lutz Meschke pointed out that the demands of their customers may be different than with volume brands in the VW Group, so that Porsche will work in some areas with other tech partners than VW, for example. “That’s why it’s important for Porsche to be extremely flexible in the future,” says the CFO.
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Meschke had previously stated that Porsche’s possible IPO would also facilitate alliances with tech companies. A high rating on the capital market helps with partnerships with them. “Such alliances are becoming increasingly important,” he said.
Mercedes, for example, works closely with the chip developer Nvidia. BMW has recently tied itself closely to semiconductor manufacturer Qualcomm. The VW Group wants to build its own operating system with its software subsidiary Cariad and is working closely with Bosch on autonomous driving functions.
Despite the chip crisis, Porsche delivered another record result last year.
(Photo: dpa)
The VW Group is considering listing a minority stake in the highly profitable subsidiary by the end of the year. “We welcome the consideration of an IPO by Porsche AG,” said Meschke, who had been campaigning for such a step for some time. This allows the Stuttgart carmaker to sharpen its profile.
Ambitious return targets
Despite uncertain economic prospects and production disruptions caused by the Ukraine war, the sports car manufacturer Porsche is sticking to its strategic goal, which has been firmly anchored for years, “to ensure a long-term operating return on sales of at least 15 percent,” explained the CFO on Friday.
However, Porsche recently had to stop production of the Taycan electric car model at the main plant in Stuttgart-Zuffenhausen and production at the Leipzig plant. Because parts were missing because suppliers had to report production losses in connection with the Ukraine war.
Orderly production is sometimes no longer possible, Meschke explained. A task force constantly monitors the effects of the war on Porsche’s business and has taken measures to ensure profits.
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“We want to ensure that we can continue to meet our high earnings requirements. The extent to which this succeeds also depends on external challenges that we cannot influence,” said Meschke cautiously. Due to the Russian attack on Ukraine, the parent company Volkswagen had declared in early March that it would stop vehicle exports to Russia and local production.
Faster fully electric
Meanwhile, Porsche boss Oliver Blume announced that the electric offensive would be strengthened with another model in the middle of the decade. The 718 sports car will then only be offered as a fully electric car.
Blume also raised the sales target for pure electric cars: by 2030, more than 80 percent of new cars sold should be fully electric. So far, the quota has applied to electrified models, i.e. both battery-electric and plug-in hybrids.
Despite the chip crisis, Porsche delivered another record result last year. The VW sports car subsidiary delivered 302,000 new cars, an increase of eleven percent. The Porsche boss did not give a sales forecast. At the beginning of the year, before the outbreak of war, sales manager Detlev von Platen was still confident of being able to maintain the pace of growth.
Sales increased by 15 percent to 33.1 billion euros. The operating result rose even more strongly by 27 percent to 5.3 billion euros. The return on sales climbed to 16.0 percent, “a value that is the envy of us in our industry worldwide,” said Meschke.
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