Interest in the race to bring electric vehicles to the masses has seen more momentum behind it in the last six months than ever before.
Spurred on by consumers frustrated by skyrocketing gas prices, automakers have kicked their electric vehicle plans into high gear.
That has lead to a rash of announcements about new products, new timelines and, above all, the new tech behind each company's plan to dominate and increasingly popular sector.
While currently only about 4% of the global car market is occupied by EVs, the number is nearly double that of 2019.
A new report from the Environmental Defense Fund outlined just how far automakers are looking ahead.
It found that over a dozen carmakers in America have rolled out plans to open EV manufacturing sites, spending $75 billion in six new states nationwide.
That is in addition to the $515 billion global auto companies are spending to build electric vehicles by 2030, when more than 100 new EV models are estimated to be on the market, the report found.
That may be welcome news for consumers, who have been having a hard time finding even used electric vehicles to buy, but alarming information for Tesla (TSLA), which has long dominated the EV sector and has built-in name brand recognition.
Now it looks like that particular brand toehold may be further eroded, as tech giant Apple (AAPL) begins its foray into the electric vehicle market.
Apple Wants to Build Your EV
Apple's push into the market for electric vehicles took a high-profile step April 29 when the company said it had poached a top EV exec from Ford to lead its own program.
Desi Ujkashevic was part of a team that oversaw car development and safety efforts, but before that she was an engineering whiz, overseeing the building of electrical components, interiors, exteriors and the chassis.
She also developed new electric vehicles for Ford.
Now at Apple, Ujkashevic will become a crucial part of Apple's electric car push, helping it sort out regulatory hurdles and reorder a department that has been chaotic over the last year.
Apple's plan to have an electric car of its own has been percolating since 2015, when it launched its efforts to also create a fully autonomous vehicle.
Since then, its EV team has seen a game of musical chairs at the top levels, losing talent in robotics, engineering and hardware to a variety of other automakers, including Ford.
Apple has a goal of putting its own EV on the road by 2025, a plan that Ujkashevic, a 31-year veteran of Ford, will now help succeed.
