Porsche bumps up its investment in EV company Rimac Automobili

With the release of its first fully battery-electric production vehicle, the Taycan, it's clear that Porsche is committed to a more electrified future, but it's not going to go about that on its own. 

Several months ago, Porsche acquired a small stake in Croatian EV startup Rimac Automobili, and according to an announcement made by Rimac on Friday, Porsche has just upped its investment to 15.5%.

While 15.5% is hardly a controlling interest or even a major stake, it's still a significant amount of money that's changing hands, and having access to Rimac's incredible EV knowledge will give Porsche a serious leg up on the competition. 

"Porsche has accompanied Rimac in its positive development for a year," says Lutz Meschke, deputy chairman of the executive board and CFO of Porsche AG, in a statement. "It quickly became clear to us that Porsche and Rimac could learn a lot from each other. We are convinced of Mate Rimac and his company, so now we have increased our stake and are expanding our cooperation in battery technology."

Rimac has partnered up with a few other car companies to help them strengthen their electric performance games, notable among them being Hyundai with its $90 million investment. These partnerships being managed alongside the development of their own vehicles reminds us of Lotus in its heyday, and that's not a bad thing.

"We are just at the beginning of our partnership -- and yet our high expectations have already been met. We have many ideas that we want to action together in the future," said Mate Rimac, founder and CEO of Rimac Automobili, in a statement. "The key is to create a win-win situation for both partners and to add value to our end customers by developing exciting electrified models."

Rimac has been working on finalizing its utterly bananas C Two electric hyper-grand touring car that it claims will have nearly 2,000 horsepower, and which made its debut in concept form in Geneva in 2018.

Rimac C Two is a gonzo 1,914-horsepower electric hypercar

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