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Ex GM chief issues Apple car warning: ‘They have no idea what they’re getting into’

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By John McCarthy | Opinion Editor

February 18, 2015 | 2 min read

Dan Akerson, a former chief executive of General Motors, has warned Apple against becoming fully embroiled in the auto industry in response to media reports documenting the tech giant’s interest in electric cars.

Following a report from the Wall Street Journal last weekend that Apple has enlisted "several hundred" employees for a top secret electric car project, Akerson claimed the firm’s backers would likely be unhappy to hear the news.

Akerson told Bloomberg: “I think somebody is kind of trying to cough up a hairball here, if I were an Apple shareholder, I wouldn’t be very happy. I would be highly suspect of the long-term prospect of getting into a low-margin, heavy-manufacturing.

“A lot of people who don’t ever operate [in the auto industry] don’t understand and have a tendency to underestimate, look at the margins of an iPhone versus a car, I’d rather have the margins associated with the phone and produce 74.5 million of the devices.”

To conclude, Akerson issued a warning to Apple, “they’d better think carefully if they want to get into the hard-core manufacturing, we take steel, raw steel, and turn it into car. They have no idea what they’re getting into if they get into that".

Apple has already worked several auto industry projects including integrating its 'CarPlay' system with for Ferrari, Mercedes-Benz and Volvo vehicles.

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