Saudi Arabia's First Homegrown Car Brand Is Here — Built With Foxconn

Saudi Arabia has never had its own car company — until now. The kingdom just showed off Ceer, a new automaker jointly owned by Saudi Arabia's giant state investment fund and Foxconn, the Taiwanese manufacturer best known for assembling iPhones. The name Ceer means "drive forward" in Arabic, and the whole project is a centerpiece of Vision 2030, the country's plan to build industries that don't depend on pumping oil. Two concept vehicles were revealed: a sedan and an SUV, both sold under the name Exobot.

The show cars are meant to turn heads. Both have falcon doors (called "Shahin Wing" here) instead of normal ones, a rectangular steering yoke instead of a round wheel, and glass that dims or turns clear at the push of a button. Inside, a 48-inch screen stretches across the dashboard, styled after the Riyadh skyline. The light bars use 32 separate elements — one for each year since Saudi Arabia was founded in 1932. There's even a special air-conditioning mode that blows cool air between the glass roof and passengers' heads to survive desert heat. Apple CarPlay and Android Auto will work at launch, and the cars can receive software updates over the air, just like a phone.

For Foxconn, this is another step beyond making iPhones — the company is trying to become a contract builder for electric vehicles. For Saudi Arabia, it means manufacturing jobs, new tech skills, and a way to keep revenue flowing as the world slowly moves away from oil. If Ceer succeeds, it could also add pressure to a crowded EV market already fighting over buyers and prices.

The catch: these are still concepts, and concept cars often shrink or change before they reach showrooms. Ceer says it wants seven models by 2030, some hybrids, but currently has no plans to sell outside the Gulf region. Building a car company from scratch is brutally hard — even with deep pockets, the first real deliveries are years away and prices haven't been announced.