Osram is planning on establishing a joint venture with Continental, a German automotive manufacturing company, to develop products for automotive lighting, reported Reuters.

(Image: Osram)

The magazine also mentioned the joint venture, reported to hire around 1,500 employees, will start in early 2018. Both companies will each invest an amount of EUR 200-300 million to this new business unit.According to sources cited in German business weekly Wirtschaftawoche, Osram hopes to shift parts of its automotive lighting business to the joint venture to integrate with that of electronic control systems Continental will submit.

Osram and Continental have been in talks to possibly set up a joint venture for the development of automotive lighting products but yet to finalize agreements on commercial terms.

Images: Osram (top), Continental (bottom)

As a lighting giant, Osram have recently debuted a few advanced lighting technologies and earned favourable reception. According to Osram’s 2Q17 financial report, in light of the strong demand from the vehicle industry, the revenue of its specialty lighting business, including automotive lighting, rose by 8% YoY. The EBITDA margin hiked to 16.2%, higher than 15.8% in 2Q16.