General Motors and Honda have signed a non-binding memorandum of understanding to establish a North American automotive alliance. The alliance will focus on cooperation in connected service, research and development, platform sharing and joint purchasing activities.
The agreement will help both the companies to accelerate investment in future mobility innovation and achieving substantial cost efficiencies by freeing up additional resources.
The companies will be sharing platform including electrified and internal combustion propulsion systems. Co-development planning discussions will begin immediately, with engineering work beginning in early 2021.
Through joint purchasing activities will create further cost efficiencies by leveraging both companies’ respective scale, insight and best practices. Purchasing collaboration would be focused on joint sourcing of materials, logistics and localization strategies.
R&D and connected services cooperation will focus on advanced technology areas, including electrical architecture, advanced driver assist systems, infotainment, connectivity and vehicle-to-everything communication.
In April, the companies announced that Honda will incorporate GM’s OnStar safety, security and connected services into the two all-new electric vehicles for Honda based on GM’s global EV platform, seamlessly integrating them with HondaLink. Based on that collaboration, GM and Honda will explore further co-development opportunities for future connected services, including GM’s OnStar and infotainment.
In April the companies had also agreed to jointly develop two all-new electric vehicles for Honda based on GM’s highly flexible global EV platform powered by Ultium batteries. The GM-Honda are also collaborating on on fuel cells, batteries and the Cruise Origin shared autonomous vehicle.
All facets of the alliance will be governed by a joint committee, comprising senior executives from both companies.
