宝马奥迪戴姆勒为什么要联手买下诺基亚地图？

    本周一（8月3日），德国三大高档汽车制造商宝马、奥迪和戴姆勒同意共同出资约28亿美元收购诺基亚的数字地图业务HERE，以加强各自产品的自动驾驶能力。

    三家公司在HERE占股份额相同。据路透社报道，三家公司集各方之力，击败了来自硅谷和中国的其他潜在收购者。收购HERE将使宝马、奥迪和戴姆勒的豪华轿车可以推出一些新的高端功能，比如自动驾驶。在和零部件供应商以及优步、谷歌和苹果公司的同类软件进行长期竞争的过程中，此举将让它们占据优势。

    4月份收购阿尔卡特-朗讯后，诺基亚一直在进行整合，转让HERE业务则是整合计划的一部分。

    HERE的数字地图用户包括世界上大多数顶级汽车厂商以及亚马逊、雅虎和百度等公司，它的主要竞争对手则是谷歌地图。有人猜测，被德国汽车三巨头收购后，HERE的一些用户可能转投谷歌阵营。自动驾驶汽车要靠地图系统来避免交通堵塞和事故，也要靠它来寻找充电站。

    戴姆勒集团首席执行官、管理委员会主席蔡澈在一份公告中表示：“高精度数字地图是今后人们出行的关键组成部分。”收购HERE旨在“确保这项针对所有汽车制造商、供应商以及其他行业客户的核心服务的自主性。”（财富中文网）

    译者：Charlie

    校对：詹妮

    A consortium of German premium carmakers agreed Monday to buy HERE, Nokia’s maps business, for about $2.8 billion in a move geared toward boosting their cars’ autonomous driving capabilities.

    The BMW Group, Audi AG, and Daimler AG will hold equal stakes in HERE. They pooled their resources to outbid other interested acquirers in Silicon Valley and China, according to Reuters. Buying the mapping technology allows the car companies to offer new premium features—including self-driving capabilities—in their luxury vehicles, which gives them a better hand in their on-going battle against parts suppliers and software rivals in Uber, Google GOOG 0.90% , and Apple AAPL -2.36% .

    Nokia was looking to shed its mapping division as part of its integration with Alcatel-Lucent, which it purchased in April.

    HERE supplies digital maps to most of the world’s top automakers and to companies like Amazon AMZN -0.21% , Yahoo YHOO 0.05% , and Baidu. Its main competitor is Google Maps. There’s speculation that the German automakers’ purchase of HERE may prompt HERE’s current customers to embrace Google’s technology instead.

    Self-driving cars rely on mapping systems to avoid traffic jams or accidents and to find electric charging stations.

    “High-precision digital maps are a crucial component of the mobility of the future,” Dieter Zetsche, CEO and chairman of Daimler AG, said in a statement. The deal is aimed at “secur[ing] the independence of this central service for all vehicle manufacturers, suppliers and customers in other industries.”