TORONTO, Sept. 9, 2021 – Development continues on the Maple Majestic Canadian EV by Toronto-based AK Motor, with significant milestones reached in bringing together the right partners for the project. Maple Majestic is intended to be Canada’s flagship brand of automobiles for the world market. In building this vehicle, AK Motor is trailblazing an innovative new business model that is ideally tailored to Canada. The Maple Majestic vehicle is being developed using external suppliers for components and assembly services, as well as technological innovations and academia. The Maple Majestic EV project is divided into module packages which represent complete projects for leading suppliers with expertise in these areas. AK Motor is providing an opportunity for these companies to effectively take ownership of these modules, and to unleash the full power of their creative potential. In using this strategy, AK Motor is reaching out to parts suppliers for opportunities in co-operation.
The global shift towards Electric Vehicles represents an opportunity for Canada to become more than a parts supplier for the world’s OEMs. It is an opportunity for Canada to shape its own destiny, and lead with its own automotive brands. Recent years have shown that the world is very receptive to new players entering the automotive arena, and this is a chance for Canada that will not repeat itself any time soon. At the core of this opportunity lies the need to recognize that Canada cannot do things the way it used to. Building parts and developing technologies has been the traditional approach for Canadian companies for many years, but the real opportunity is to create a Canadian automotive brand that leverages these resources.
AK Motor’s logic of working with parts suppliers extends to organizations of different structures, like assembly services, developers of new technologies and academia. The objective is to create an ecosystem for the development and manufacture of Canadian automobiles. Figuring out the best way to integrate these diverse automotive building blocks now will go a long way towards securing Canada’s future as an automotive manufacturing country, creating unprecedented opportunities for future generations of Canadians. A great example of this co-operation is AK Motor’s recent usage of the VR Cave which is operated by Invest WindsorEssex. The VR CAVE is Canada’s largest publicly accessible facility that was created through the support of the Province of Ontario’s Autonomous Vehicle Innovation Network and Windsor-Essex being designated as a Regional Technology Development Site. Working with the Simulation Team at the Invest WindsorEssex VR CAVE allows for the immersive visualization of the Maple Majestic virtual prototype to showcase how the vehicle will transform through its pre-production journey.
“Canada’s automotive industry is at a cross-roads and there is a lot at stake at this very moment. There has been a tremendous amount of investment into Canadian technologies in recent years, but if we don’t produce our own Canadian automobiles to harness these technologies, this situation can easily turn into the greatest brain drain Canada has ever seen. Technologies are most commonly developed in close proximity to where they will be produced, and if there are no local Canadian OEMs to implement the technologies, it stands to reason that their production may be relocated to other world regions. A project like Maple Majestic has the capacity to anchor the production of technologies that were developed in Canada, right here in Canada, giving them the sort of long-term stability and profitability that only a world-class Canadian brand of automobiles can.” – Arkadiusz Kaminski
The Maple Majestic project display can be seen at the Drive Festival at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park on September 10-12, 2021.