Apple and Tesla

The reported recent meeting of Tim Cook, Elon Musk, and the M&A chief of Apple has created a lot of whisper in the market about possible acquisition of Tesla by Apple. With over US$150 billion in cash on hand at Apple, a $25 billion acquisition of Tesla is not even a question financially. However, big acquisition has never been shown as part of Apple’s DNA. So, an ‘out of the box’ acquisition of getting into automobile industry really invites suspicion among people.

I think Apple is busy developing a lot of products, the iWatch, the iTV, the iHeadphone, etc. Most of them would be more closely related to their existing products and expertise. I’m sure iOS can be part of ‘experience’ in automobile, for back-seat infotainment, driver reference, alert, communication of all sorts. And, the latest guess about the theme of that meeting is about battery which would make a lot of sense as both company see battery as the key bottleneck in the development of their products. However, if it is really about battery, why the M&A chief was tagging along? Should that be the CIO, product design, engineer instead? Correct me if I’m wrong that I don’t see Tesla has a battery unit that it will be willing to sell to Apple! So, the presence of the M&A guy is really the key puzzle that makes people guessing! So, that US$25 billion acquisition is not really off the table as many people might think after all….Well, I guess time will tell.