Apple may be planning to ride shotgun when it comes to the design of its rumored self-driving car.
The Cupertino, Calif.-based tech giant has approached McLaren, the British luxury supercar maker, about a potential acquisition valued as high as $2 billion, according to a report out Wednesday.
Apple has been in talks with McLaren for several months, weighing a strategic investment or possibly an outright acquisition, according to the Financial Times, which first reported on the talks.
In tapping an outside car designer like McLaren, Apple would be mimicking the initial strategy at Tesla, whose CEO Elon Musk used Lotus-designed bodies for the electric-car maker’s early Roadster model.
McLaren — which cranked out about 1,650 cars last year, some of them priced as high as $1 million apiece, to generate nearly $600 million in revenue — on Wednesday afternoon sought to tap the brakes on speculation.
McLaren is “not in discussion with Apple in respect of any potential investment,” the UK car maker said. “As you would expect, the nature of our brand means we regularly have confidential conversations with a wide range of parties, but we keep them confidential.”
The owners of McLaren Technology Group, including Chairman and CEO Ron Dennis, control about 80 percent of McLaren Automotive.
Apple, valued at more than $600 billion with a cash pile of $231 billion as of June 30, declined to comment.
Apple, meanwhile, has been in discussions to acquire Lit Motors, a San Francisco-based startup that has created an electric motorcycle with a car-like enclosure that self-balances with a pair of gyroscopes, according to the New York Times.
This summer, Apple reportedly reshuffled its two-year-old car project, code-named “Project Titan,” replacing its leader Steve Zadesky with Apple veteran Bob Mansfield.