So I've always wondered if Apple actually building a 'car' was ever really the goal. It seems like a skunkworks where they try crazy things and then incorporate into Carplay.
Future seems to be ever expanding Carplay support. I use it and probably would not buy another car that did not have it integrated. I imagine car manufacturers are somewhat tired of always building HUDs and in vehicle control systems. So gradually standardizing on a way to take all the displays/touchscreens in a vehicle and let them be run by Carplay seems like the future. Eventually, they can start handing more and more of the software side (not their specialty) off to people cellphones via some interface, particularly around media.
As the ubiquiti of the M1/M2 type chip is found in all of our pockets (embedded ML silicon), the car companies will no longer have to actually embed it in a vehicle as an add on. Plugging in your phone with an M1/M2 type chip will unlock Siri or similar AI functionality in the vehicle. Sure it will drive without it, just like it does now, but it wont be 'cool' and have all the assist, nav, and media functionality everyone wants.
I think this is a fair take, and I've had similar thoughts too. However, one thing computer industry people don't seem to get is how much the idea of Apple owning the "dials" on the instrument cluster as shown in the keynote this year will likely go down like a cup of cold sick at most European auto makers. In many cases the designs or colors used in the dial faces have decades of brand history behind them.
Regardless of what customers desire, auto-makers are in no rush to become just a dumb pipe for apple or google's driving software. So far not one automaker has of yet publicly announced support or plans to support the more extensive CarPlay Apple demoed. I think if it does ship, it will need to support far, far more customization on interface and dial-faces than was shown in the keynote for auto-makers not to feel totally sold out of the cabin.
It was slightly disappointing to me I've only really seen Nilay Patel at the Verge in the media point this out; anyone with experience of the car industry I think will come to a similar conclusion. People may forget, it took a very long time for some automakers to even trust adding the existing CarPlay, partly due to concerns regarding loss of control of cabin features. Old CarPlay is is a far less intrusive system than the one Apple are proposing now.
As a thought experiment - if I personally ran BMW or Mercedes, I would have real concerns about dilution of the brand by adopting a generic industry wide car UI, even if I also think Apple would probably do a great job. Maybe the carrot of Apple solving autonomy as part of the package might be enough to swing the deal, but even there, I think in time legacy automakers will work out who to aqui-hire to build their own systems instead of selling out completely.
Strongly disagree with this; we have many indications that Apple's efforts aren't just on CarPlay.
First, Apple's car project is clearly mostly focused on self-driving (tying into Apple's mapping efforts). To steelman your argument, it's possible that Apple's just trying to develop self-driving software that car companies can just adopt into their cars, but that would be absolutely unprecedented for Apple; they just don't do licensing deals like this. The fact that Apple's developing self-driving AI means that either they plan on rolling out a consumer car, or rolling out a robotaxi service (as a subscription service, which Apple is interested in). It's either licensing, or using it for their own cars; there's no scenario where self-driving is built-into CarPlay, since if you forgot your phone, your car wouldn't work; and it wouldn't work for Android users either. Self-driving will never be a CarPlay/Android Auto feature that "plugs into" a "dumb car". Too finicky.
Second, Apple's clearly investing heavily in car hardware and all related technologies (battery, etc). The most informed people on Apple are Mark Gurman and Ming-Chi Kuo, and they both agree that Apple's developing its own car hardware. See, for example, a 20-year Lamborghini vehicle R&D veteran hired to help design the car just two months ago.[0] That goes far, far beyond CarPlay. Kevin Lynch (who was in charge of Apple Watch) took over the project. There's tons of indications that this is about hardware, not just software.
Personally, I feel it would be better for Apple to design an electric bike than a car; but hey. Car likely comes first, then bike (just like: VR goggles first, then AR/XR glasses). Also far more ways to integrate content consumption (TV, Music) and productivity features in a car.
> imagine car manufacturers are somewhat tired of always building HUDs and in vehicle control systems. So gradually standardizing on a way to take all the displays/touchscreens in a vehicle and let them be run by Carplay seems like the future.
What is then remaining as distinctive feature of a car vendor? The design?
With their custom entertainment system they can confront they driver with their own brand identity and differentiate how they integrate the different features.
But with EVs the engines aren't as different as fossil fuel engines, they don't have their gear shifting with that adjustment anymore. Lots of brand vlauebis lost and becomes obvious to the buyer that cars are 95% the same across brands.
I was thinking along those lines, but the majority of phones are Android and I can't see a car manufacturer tying major features of a vehicle to users of Apple phones.
Do they get Google to implement equivalent Android features just as CarPlay and Android Auto are complementary now? In some ways that makes sense (you get the personal assistant you prefer instead of one provided by the car company) but it means differentiation must be limited because the car can't change too much depending on what phone is plugged into it.
HUDs are the small part of the story. far more important thing is what sensors you have access to and what can you control? Car manufactures are notoriously behind and bad on properly expanding and standardizing both sensors and controls. So, it is impossible to deliver consistent experience and capabilities. Even in 2022, most manufacturer haven't still figured out how to do firmware update without using USB drives. You can't even use phone to unlock cars. These are not hard things, but car manufacturers just can't get around to do it given their ancient and inefficient supply chains and factories which are only optimized for price wars, not leap-frogging experience. CarPlay is great for music and may be some cute graphics of basic gauges but the real value ultimately lies in some level of self-driving, assisted features and holistic integration which cannot be enabled without having complete control of hardware.
Almost every new car sold in the developed world has a display in the dashboard, but very few actually have a Heads-Up Display (HUD) projected in the driver's line of sight. It's mostly just premium models from GM and BMW that come with this feature. It's a shame that more cars don't have a HUD as it really does help to reduce driver distractions.
Agree Apple is using it as a play ground for CarPlay and never going to ship an actual car. Maybe at project inception that was a possible delivery. At this point with legacy makers actually making competent EV offerings.. no.
Car market has many challenges that cause production and sales to scale slowly. Even if they outsource manufacturing, like Fisker has down with Magna (which no one has done at the many many millions scale Apple would need to).. what about service centers?
Next cars face various tax, tariff and regulatory challenges far beyond any market Apple participates in today. They couldn't simply make the cars in Shenzhen and ship them across easily. Almost certainly some non-trivial amount of assembly would need to happen domestically which means a US workforce and potential union concerns. This is due both to tariffs and to maximize applicability of the new EV tax credit law.
Further, I don't think Apple likely brings any special sauce to ADAS/Autonomy, and its a hard challenge many of the current players underestimate & overpromise.
Oh and repairability and granularity of components/modules. EVs need to be serviceable in ways that phones/tablets/Macs are not. Car needs to be designed for this, and parts supply networks need to exist. This is not an Apple forte.
All this to enter a traditionally low margin, boom&bust industry? No thanks.
Making the iPhone more sticky seems like a solid play. Use the phone in place of a key. Keep maintenance records on the phone. Tap a few buttons on the app and give the dealer a virtual key to the car so you can get it serviced. States are already putting IDs in to apps and the wallet. etc.. Maybe use the phone for various road passes and such, that seems like an easy and natural extension.
Around the time the self-driving craze sort of took off, the noise in the echo chamber was that Apple was terribly far behind in 2 main categories: services and AI/ML. Now, they're charging ahead with services and they've got custom ML hardware on every single device they sell. A car seems like too big of a project with too much hype to use as a forcing function for all that stuff.
Seems like there are some strong health and safety plays as well. If you have a watch on, it already can do fall detection. Car crash detection is a logical next step, if all the passengers had watches on, they could start sending real-time telemetry to the paramedics, maybe encourage them to prioritize a passenger that was in greater distress. With the cameras and such, there is absolutely enough processing power in your iPhone to look for drivers falling asleep and with some other data they could probably make a pretty good guess if you're intoxicated.
My concern was that Apple would make a car and it would be a McLaren or something, it would be coveted, look amazing, and be just about completely unattainable. Now if I could buy a Toyota or a Hyundai and just plug my phone in and it became the brain of the car? I'd talk myself in to taking a new car for a test drive to try it.
Seeing how boring Carplay has been so far I’d have my doubts about skunkworks. That said it makes sense they might be working on exclusive operating system of sorts. The way car systems (100s of suppliers and their implementation) work nowadays is insane.
I wouldn't buy such a car to be honest. I thought the future would be more accessible cars, not some locked in trash where you have to pay dividends to even more suppliers. Although the car industry is heavily guilty here as well.
For me a car is a tool. Aside from playing music, a technology available since forever, I don't expect much. Navigation is a solved issue for the most part. Self-driving cars are far away. An actual HUD is really nice, but many manufacturers already include them. If there is ever a standard, Apple would not be a good custodian.
Of course it is. Apple wants 30% of everything their car delivers you to. You're Apple's customer and they're bringing their customers to your business so clearly they deserve 30%. Plus even more lock-in, if you want to switch to Android or something else you'll have to buy a new car.
I always assumed it was an employee retention project. Jony Ive seemed bored of re-designing yet another rounded rect with a black mirror and was ready to leave, to attract top AI people you need a self-driving project, etc. But I guess at this point it has gone too far for just that.
It seems Mercedes are not going that direction at all with with the EQ range. They've gone all in, the MMI is deeply embedded into the car, speech recognition runs locally, it can control performance mode, seat massagers, huge swathes of car specific functionality, via speech, that I think Apple would have an uphill to catch up with, universally, across all vendors.
I doubt the upper tier of manufacturers would be happy with mere UI skins either.
Cars that are more like appliances, shared cars, with user customization in your phone, maybe that could work?
I would guess that for like twenty years Apple had sort of plan stored away to launch a television. Do you remember Mac TV? Pippin? They probably considered it as a possible integration with Apple TV. That would mean for decades there was someone planning the product: How long would it take to launch? How much would it cost? What might the design be? What would be the business plan?
As they've taken over more of the car's UI, I've wondered if the main goal is to bring a Comma-like feature to CarPlay. They could sell a lot more Pro-level iPhones if Apple offered self-driving functionality through CarPlay (but only for the top-tier Pro models).
But why won't Apple possibly build a device like comma.ai to basically fit into the car's OBD port and also bring in some self driving abilities and eventually full self driving, just by a completely new device that pairs to the iPhone. They can possibly strong arm autos to make the plug and play real smooth. It's not that far fetched. They might actually be able to do something using mixed reality, given how either pure vision based or lidar based self driving approaches are still not reaching the levels they were supposed to years ago.
This could be under the usual AI umbrella like other companies, but the fact that there is an AI DR to Tim Cook makes me think self driving is big on the agenda. I"m not sure which other AI effort is so valuable to Apple to warrant a SVP.
https://www.apple.com/in/leadership/john-giannandrea/
I don't get why Apple's user experience keeps being repeated as "second to none". It really depends on what you are doing and used to. I personally find Android easier to use than iOS, but maybe I would feel differently if I haven't been using it for a while.
Given the number of times I've seen a reported, verified bug in OS X be "fixed" by hiding the bug from the public tracker and marking it "will not fix," I would have a hard time ever trusting a car made by Apple.
Apple also makes their products to be disposable, seemingly as part of the culture, while a well-made electric car can run to a million miles over 50+ years. That's a very different build philosophy.
The key to me is that Apple presents the image of perfect fit and finish--beyond that their products are not problematic in a lot of ways (ability to modify them, or expand them, or extend them in ways that Apple doesn't approve of...). Some of their tech is cool, don't get me wrong. But it's far from perfect.
I would imagine an Apple car that only supports Apple Maps, Apple Music/Podcasts, and Siri and will only connect to iOS devices...and that costs twice as much as the Tesla for the base model, and more if you want a reasonable range. Pandora? Spotify? Waze? Meh. Sorry. Oh, and don't forget monthly fees for navigation; probably more like the $36/month of the Audi EV than the free navigation for the Tesla.
I'm sure there's a market for it. There are a lot of people who love Apple and who have money.
>a well-made electric car can run to a million miles over 50+ years. That's a very different build philosophy.
Source? Apple currently makes the longest lasting consumer devices with the longest lasting software support, so not sure how one can conclude longevity is not in their build “philosophy”.
>I would imagine an Apple car that only supports Apple Maps, Apple Music/Podcasts, and Siri and will only connect to iOS devices...and that costs twice as much as the Tesla for the base model, and more if you want a reasonable range. Pandora? Spotify? Waze? Meh. Sorry. Oh, and don't forget monthly fees for navigation; probably more like the $36/month of the Audi EV than the free navigation for the Tesla.
Why? All of those apps are
usable in every Apple device’s OS today, including Carplay. And Apple Maps has had free navigation since inception.
Also, I can get into almost any recent car and plug in my iPhone or Android phone and have access to CarPlay and Android Auto, and get access to a ton of apps, except in a Tesla. Seems like Tesla is being the more restrictive party here.
Fit and finish has absolutely collapsed in recent Apple software. Glitches and bugs all over the place. It's almost enough to tempt one to see if this really is, finally, the year of Linux of the desktop. Almost.
I would disagree about Apple making products to be disposable, though! I've found Apple hardware to be incredibly long lasting. Their phones, ipads, and iphones all last years and years and years in my experience.
> a well-made electric car can run to a million miles over 50+ years.
That remains to be seen.
You mention Tesla as an alternative, but they're well-known for their fit and finish and repairability issues.[1][2]
Apple's software fit and finish has taken a dive. My Tesla isn't much better. (ex: I couldn't move my headrest for a month.) Poke around teslamotorsclub.com and you'll find all kinds of silly bugs that drag on.
> free navigation for the Tesla
Tesla builds 8 years of connectivity into the initial sticker cost, after that they will be charging.[3] Apple will probably charge too if it also includes network connectivity.
> Pandora? Spotify? Waze? Meh. Sorry.
Apple is especially bad about lock-in. I understand Pandora, Spotify, and Waze are installable on CarPlay (I haven't tried them), but there's still plenty of walled garden stuff going on elsewhere.
> while a well-made electric car can run to a million miles over 50+ years
That is a big claim, which is completely unsupported by reality. ICEVs do not get recycled because the engine died. Body rot, repairs that cost more than the value of the car, etc, this is why cars are taken off the road.
If anything, the current batch of early generation EVs are probably going to have shorter than average lifespans compared to established ICEVs, not longer.
I didn't buy a macbook because it had Apple logo on it, I bought it because of the M1 chip that was 1 generation ahead of anybody else. Similarly, I bought an iPhone mini because its form factor worked very well for me.
If Apple introduced a VR headset I can already tell you that I won't buy it. If their car is inferior to others on the market then I won't buy it. I think most Apple consumer falls in the same camp as me.
>while a well-made electric car can run to a million miles over 50+ years. That's a very different build philosophy.
I'm trying to decide if this is something you actually think or is incredibly thick hyperbole. Why would you say a well-made electric car could run that many miles rather than the 200k+ mile cars that actually exist?
A full Apple Car has always seemed unrealistic to me. Cars are a fundamentally different industry then consumer electronics and software. Apple would be starting from scratch, and facing a lot of entrenched competition with huge budgets and infrastructure.
And for what? What could Apple do that GM, Toyota, or Tesla couldn't? Maybe a better UX for the dashboard. And while many car UXs are absolutely terrible, improving them isn't some insurmountable challenge for existing manufacturers. And besides, Apple could just expand carplay and partner with car manufacturers, which seems like it would work better for everyone involved.
Apple doesn't get into low margin businesses. They get into an adjacent business. A prime example is TVs. There is no Apple TV set. There is AppleTV, a high margin add on for any TV with HDMI that makes it "just work".
They had the chance to buy a cellular carrier, but chose not to, because it's low margin. Instead they make a phone that works on any carrier.
Cars are a low margin business. But a car add-on could be a high margin business. They already have CarPlay, but I can see them making a hardware add-on for cars.
I think people focus too much on the actual car in this speculation. What about the service? Apple is really, really good at finding industries full of bullshit (computers in the 80's, mobile phones in the early 2000's) and saying, "okay, here's a slightly better looking product, with fewer features, and no more bullshit."
The vehicle market is full of bullshit. Tesla took the same tactic and has knocked it down considerably, but there's still the rest of the market.
The iBug will probably be good for some people but horrible for others.
"It just works" is a fine motto, but a lie. Devices often need intervention to work properly or to work at all. Laptops and phones generally require a lot less intervention than cars. Some of us are happy to outsource that labour to others. Some of us are fascinated with how things work and prefer to at least try fixing things ourselves. I have learned from personal experience that Apple is outright hostile to the latter form of folk.
I fully expect an Apple car will have all manner of non-standard screws, fasteners, and parts. It will be technically possible for third party mechanics to deal with, but letting one breathe on your iBug will void the warranty. Just opening the hood will, no doubt, require special tools and break multiple tamper-proof warranty-voiding seals.
If you're happy taking your iBug into an Apple store every time you hear a new noise, you'll be fine with an iBug. If you're the sort who wants to pop the hood and try to track down the problem yourself, then beware!
This is a disappointing read, zero insight into objectives beyond an EV for end consumers.
There is so much more to consider - progressing Carplay integration, demand for processing/sensing, partnerships, building knowledge, etc. Take the Sony Vision S for example, that was never intended to be a produced vehicle.
It’s funny how Apple CarPlay is basically the Android of the car world. While Tesla is more like IOS/iPhone, controlling both the hardware and software.
I wish Toyota would partner with Apple for their internal maps, screen, controls, etc. Toyota seems to have a major problem with intuitive usability (especially for my parents who are in their 80s).
Toyota is the largest car company in the world and makes the most reliable vehicles in the world, but they need that extra touch to take them to the next level.
Just as I would never by a phone that is not an iPhone, or a laptop that is not a MacBook, I would never buy a car that is not a Toyota. But Toyota does have some room for improvement.
Also, an Apple-Toyota partnership would make Teslas look pathetic in comparison.
There have been a lot of failed new car company startups. Like the Tucker, the Bricklin, the DeLorean. It's really, really, really hard to create a new car company. The usual problem is way, way underestimating the amount of capital it will take.
Tesla is an amazing company because they achieved it.
Apple's expertise is in making software and tiny electrical gadgets. How they thought that would translate into expertise in making cars is beyond me. It makes about as much sense as diversifying into making jet engines.
Does anyone really think Apple is building a car? I don't and I never did. It makes no sense. It's not an industry one can just "switch into." The capital requirements for owning a car factory are ridiculous and it's not something you can outsource. There is zero crossover between consumer entertainment devices and the car business, as evidenced by the poor state of tech in cars! This is not something Apple can fix by making cars.
Disney said no to buying Teitter because it would be a bad look, is a chaotic & messy property to acquire. It would be hard to manage & sully their clean image.
Associating yourself with automobiles doesnt feel exactly the same, but there's a similar jist to me. Cars have some very obvious bad impact on this world. Supporting & selling them is a pain. Trying to keep yourself as a loved respected treasured company would be much more difficult, quite likely impossible.
Automotive EE here… any article that talks about Tesla’s financials even indirectly and it does not immediately mention how much money they make by selling carbon credits back to GM Ford and Stellantis can pay immediately be disregarded.
A casual look at the numbers doesn’t explain much. But if you look at that 7% margin, and realize that Tesla is nearly doubling that with carbon credit sales which are 100% margin. It changes the picture.
Anyone else has a car they make 7% minus buying credits to be able to sell more in California. Tesla sells a car they make more. Without the carbon program Tesla would drastically have to change its model, which will be interesting because everyone is selling their own EVs and won’t need to buy as many credits soon.
It makes no sense for Apple to get into vehicles for 20 reasons, this is just one. They’re way too late.
HN seems like the sort of audience who can tell me. This is a serious question: Why would anybody listen to Jean-Louis Gassée?
What I see is a career of failures, at Apple, at Be, at Palm, JLG was dealt good hands and some bad hands but played each indifferently. Did I miss something important ?
The Polestar 2 feels like what an 'Apple car' would be like, to me. It seems to have a giant Android tablet in the middle console. Looks pretty smooth and tasteful overall but I can't summon up any excitement for it.
A mild problem that Apple has is that they seem to spend a lot of time solving the sort of problems that a highly paid VP from California would have.
Being frustrated by the driving experience and trying to solve that problem is in that category, being focused on the sort of annoyances that people spending huge amounts of time driving to Cupertino would have.
Meanwhile city governments around the US and the world are trying very hard to reduce the amount of cars on the road.
Would be nice if Apple were thinking ahead and not contributing to the entrenchment of this 20th century technology.
I found the announced enhancements to car play very interesting. To my understanding, it aims for replacing most of the user-facing software in cars. This is very tempting for car manufacturers, not to compete with car play, but just embrace it. It almost looks as if car play is to become the Windows of the car industry - instead of trying to come up with your own solution, just install the most widely used software available on the market. That could be a big step for Apple and hugely profitable, in the same way Windows made Microsoft into the giant it is.
It just could be that. But that would depend on the car manufacturers giving up on their own software so easily and it would be a completely new strategy for Apple. They love to control the whole stack. Even in cases, where they entered a market with a collaboration - the early iPod Phones come to my mind - they later switched to their own product.
Also, the rumor about an Apple car does keep coming back. And they spend a lot of money on what ever they are doing. So while the play on just Car Play might be strong, they do have something brewing in case car manufacturers don't just jump onto it. My favorite theory though is: they are building something which will be a "car" but as different from current cars as the iPhone was from mobile phones of its day and age. I would be really curious to see that.
Possible CarPlay expansion aside--I can't even summon up a good devil's advocate argument for this.
I was having a discussion over the weekend over where Apple goes next with respect to hardware. I think my money is on AR if the many technical limitations can be overcome. There are also the social issues but as with many other things, I suspect a lot of people would be willing to put up with even more ubiquitous cameras in exchange for convenience whether you like it or not.
I don't even think about buying cars less than 10 years old or so. I have actually had better luck doing this than when I used to buy cars new or nearly-new. It weeds out the lemons and the owners who don't take care of their cars.
Let someone else take the depreciation and find out how they hold up in the long term. Does Apple have any history of supporting its hardware for that long?
[+] [-] fdye|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] giobox|3 years ago|reply
Regardless of what customers desire, auto-makers are in no rush to become just a dumb pipe for apple or google's driving software. So far not one automaker has of yet publicly announced support or plans to support the more extensive CarPlay Apple demoed. I think if it does ship, it will need to support far, far more customization on interface and dial-faces than was shown in the keynote for auto-makers not to feel totally sold out of the cabin.
It was slightly disappointing to me I've only really seen Nilay Patel at the Verge in the media point this out; anyone with experience of the car industry I think will come to a similar conclusion. People may forget, it took a very long time for some automakers to even trust adding the existing CarPlay, partly due to concerns regarding loss of control of cabin features. Old CarPlay is is a far less intrusive system than the one Apple are proposing now.
As a thought experiment - if I personally ran BMW or Mercedes, I would have real concerns about dilution of the brand by adopting a generic industry wide car UI, even if I also think Apple would probably do a great job. Maybe the carrot of Apple solving autonomy as part of the package might be enough to swing the deal, but even there, I think in time legacy automakers will work out who to aqui-hire to build their own systems instead of selling out completely.
> https://www.theverge.com/2022/6/7/23157963/apple-carplay-nex...
[+] [-] concinds|3 years ago|reply
First, Apple's car project is clearly mostly focused on self-driving (tying into Apple's mapping efforts). To steelman your argument, it's possible that Apple's just trying to develop self-driving software that car companies can just adopt into their cars, but that would be absolutely unprecedented for Apple; they just don't do licensing deals like this. The fact that Apple's developing self-driving AI means that either they plan on rolling out a consumer car, or rolling out a robotaxi service (as a subscription service, which Apple is interested in). It's either licensing, or using it for their own cars; there's no scenario where self-driving is built-into CarPlay, since if you forgot your phone, your car wouldn't work; and it wouldn't work for Android users either. Self-driving will never be a CarPlay/Android Auto feature that "plugs into" a "dumb car". Too finicky.
Second, Apple's clearly investing heavily in car hardware and all related technologies (battery, etc). The most informed people on Apple are Mark Gurman and Ming-Chi Kuo, and they both agree that Apple's developing its own car hardware. See, for example, a 20-year Lamborghini vehicle R&D veteran hired to help design the car just two months ago.[0] That goes far, far beyond CarPlay. Kevin Lynch (who was in charge of Apple Watch) took over the project. There's tons of indications that this is about hardware, not just software.
Personally, I feel it would be better for Apple to design an electric bike than a car; but hey. Car likely comes first, then bike (just like: VR goggles first, then AR/XR glasses). Also far more ways to integrate content consumption (TV, Music) and productivity features in a car.
[0]: https://www.macrumors.com/2022/07/27/apple-car-lamborghini-e...
[+] [-] johannes1234321|3 years ago|reply
What is then remaining as distinctive feature of a car vendor? The design?
With their custom entertainment system they can confront they driver with their own brand identity and differentiate how they integrate the different features.
But with EVs the engines aren't as different as fossil fuel engines, they don't have their gear shifting with that adjustment anymore. Lots of brand vlauebis lost and becomes obvious to the buyer that cars are 95% the same across brands.
[+] [-] thinkling|3 years ago|reply
Do they get Google to implement equivalent Android features just as CarPlay and Android Auto are complementary now? In some ways that makes sense (you get the personal assistant you prefer instead of one provided by the car company) but it means differentiation must be limited because the car can't change too much depending on what phone is plugged into it.
[+] [-] sytelus|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] usefulcat|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nradov|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] steveBK123|3 years ago|reply
Car market has many challenges that cause production and sales to scale slowly. Even if they outsource manufacturing, like Fisker has down with Magna (which no one has done at the many many millions scale Apple would need to).. what about service centers?
Next cars face various tax, tariff and regulatory challenges far beyond any market Apple participates in today. They couldn't simply make the cars in Shenzhen and ship them across easily. Almost certainly some non-trivial amount of assembly would need to happen domestically which means a US workforce and potential union concerns. This is due both to tariffs and to maximize applicability of the new EV tax credit law.
Further, I don't think Apple likely brings any special sauce to ADAS/Autonomy, and its a hard challenge many of the current players underestimate & overpromise.
Oh and repairability and granularity of components/modules. EVs need to be serviceable in ways that phones/tablets/Macs are not. Car needs to be designed for this, and parts supply networks need to exist. This is not an Apple forte.
All this to enter a traditionally low margin, boom&bust industry? No thanks.
[+] [-] TheCondor|3 years ago|reply
Around the time the self-driving craze sort of took off, the noise in the echo chamber was that Apple was terribly far behind in 2 main categories: services and AI/ML. Now, they're charging ahead with services and they've got custom ML hardware on every single device they sell. A car seems like too big of a project with too much hype to use as a forcing function for all that stuff.
Seems like there are some strong health and safety plays as well. If you have a watch on, it already can do fall detection. Car crash detection is a logical next step, if all the passengers had watches on, they could start sending real-time telemetry to the paramedics, maybe encourage them to prioritize a passenger that was in greater distress. With the cameras and such, there is absolutely enough processing power in your iPhone to look for drivers falling asleep and with some other data they could probably make a pretty good guess if you're intoxicated.
My concern was that Apple would make a car and it would be a McLaren or something, it would be coveted, look amazing, and be just about completely unattainable. Now if I could buy a Toyota or a Hyundai and just plug my phone in and it became the brain of the car? I'd talk myself in to taking a new car for a test drive to try it.
[+] [-] paxys|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dzhiurgis|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hindsightbias|3 years ago|reply
Depressing if manufacturers and users want more chip/software dependencies after the last two years of supply chain fun.
[+] [-] raxxorraxor|3 years ago|reply
For me a car is a tool. Aside from playing music, a technology available since forever, I don't expect much. Navigation is a solved issue for the most part. Self-driving cars are far away. An actual HUD is really nice, but many manufacturers already include them. If there is ever a standard, Apple would not be a good custodian.
[+] [-] gernb|3 years ago|reply
/s
[+] [-] kalleboo|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lttlrck|3 years ago|reply
I doubt the upper tier of manufacturers would be happy with mere UI skins either.
Cars that are more like appliances, shared cars, with user customization in your phone, maybe that could work?
[+] [-] georgeecollins|3 years ago|reply
They probably have a few plans like that.
[+] [-] davzie|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gnicholas|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] babyshake|3 years ago|reply
What specifically about Carplay makes it so important, versus the non-Carplay equivalents that other modern cars have?
[+] [-] fuzzygroup|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] deepGem|3 years ago|reply
This could be under the usual AI umbrella like other companies, but the fact that there is an AI DR to Tim Cook makes me think self driving is big on the agenda. I"m not sure which other AI effort is so valuable to Apple to warrant a SVP. https://www.apple.com/in/leadership/john-giannandrea/
[+] [-] aetherane|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] SomeCallMeTim|3 years ago|reply
Apple also makes their products to be disposable, seemingly as part of the culture, while a well-made electric car can run to a million miles over 50+ years. That's a very different build philosophy.
The key to me is that Apple presents the image of perfect fit and finish--beyond that their products are not problematic in a lot of ways (ability to modify them, or expand them, or extend them in ways that Apple doesn't approve of...). Some of their tech is cool, don't get me wrong. But it's far from perfect.
I would imagine an Apple car that only supports Apple Maps, Apple Music/Podcasts, and Siri and will only connect to iOS devices...and that costs twice as much as the Tesla for the base model, and more if you want a reasonable range. Pandora? Spotify? Waze? Meh. Sorry. Oh, and don't forget monthly fees for navigation; probably more like the $36/month of the Audi EV than the free navigation for the Tesla.
I'm sure there's a market for it. There are a lot of people who love Apple and who have money.
[+] [-] lotsofpulp|3 years ago|reply
Source? Apple currently makes the longest lasting consumer devices with the longest lasting software support, so not sure how one can conclude longevity is not in their build “philosophy”.
>I would imagine an Apple car that only supports Apple Maps, Apple Music/Podcasts, and Siri and will only connect to iOS devices...and that costs twice as much as the Tesla for the base model, and more if you want a reasonable range. Pandora? Spotify? Waze? Meh. Sorry. Oh, and don't forget monthly fees for navigation; probably more like the $36/month of the Audi EV than the free navigation for the Tesla.
Why? All of those apps are usable in every Apple device’s OS today, including Carplay. And Apple Maps has had free navigation since inception.
Also, I can get into almost any recent car and plug in my iPhone or Android phone and have access to CarPlay and Android Auto, and get access to a ton of apps, except in a Tesla. Seems like Tesla is being the more restrictive party here.
[+] [-] dilap|3 years ago|reply
I would disagree about Apple making products to be disposable, though! I've found Apple hardware to be incredibly long lasting. Their phones, ipads, and iphones all last years and years and years in my experience.
[+] [-] runlevel1|3 years ago|reply
That remains to be seen.
You mention Tesla as an alternative, but they're well-known for their fit and finish and repairability issues.[1][2]
Apple's software fit and finish has taken a dive. My Tesla isn't much better. (ex: I couldn't move my headrest for a month.) Poke around teslamotorsclub.com and you'll find all kinds of silly bugs that drag on.
> free navigation for the Tesla
Tesla builds 8 years of connectivity into the initial sticker cost, after that they will be charging.[3] Apple will probably charge too if it also includes network connectivity.
> Pandora? Spotify? Waze? Meh. Sorry.
Apple is especially bad about lock-in. I understand Pandora, Spotify, and Waze are installable on CarPlay (I haven't tried them), but there's still plenty of walled garden stuff going on elsewhere.
[1]: https://www.thedrive.com/news/34144/the-tesla-model-y-is-alr... [2]: https://www.thedrive.com/news/41493/teslas-16000-quote-for-a... [3]: https://www.theverge.com/2022/7/27/23281022/tesla-standard-d...
EDIT: Add bit about software quality.
[+] [-] rootusrootus|3 years ago|reply
That is a big claim, which is completely unsupported by reality. ICEVs do not get recycled because the engine died. Body rot, repairs that cost more than the value of the car, etc, this is why cars are taken off the road.
If anything, the current batch of early generation EVs are probably going to have shorter than average lifespans compared to established ICEVs, not longer.
[+] [-] Aperocky|3 years ago|reply
I didn't buy a macbook because it had Apple logo on it, I bought it because of the M1 chip that was 1 generation ahead of anybody else. Similarly, I bought an iPhone mini because its form factor worked very well for me.
If Apple introduced a VR headset I can already tell you that I won't buy it. If their car is inferior to others on the market then I won't buy it. I think most Apple consumer falls in the same camp as me.
[+] [-] scarface74|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lucasmullens|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dylan604|3 years ago|reply
I'm trying to decide if this is something you actually think or is incredibly thick hyperbole. Why would you say a well-made electric car could run that many miles rather than the 200k+ mile cars that actually exist?
[+] [-] ARandumGuy|3 years ago|reply
And for what? What could Apple do that GM, Toyota, or Tesla couldn't? Maybe a better UX for the dashboard. And while many car UXs are absolutely terrible, improving them isn't some insurmountable challenge for existing manufacturers. And besides, Apple could just expand carplay and partner with car manufacturers, which seems like it would work better for everyone involved.
[+] [-] jedberg|3 years ago|reply
They had the chance to buy a cellular carrier, but chose not to, because it's low margin. Instead they make a phone that works on any carrier.
Cars are a low margin business. But a car add-on could be a high margin business. They already have CarPlay, but I can see them making a hardware add-on for cars.
[+] [-] tobyjsullivan|3 years ago|reply
The vehicle market is full of bullshit. Tesla took the same tactic and has knocked it down considerably, but there's still the rest of the market.
[+] [-] beloch|3 years ago|reply
"It just works" is a fine motto, but a lie. Devices often need intervention to work properly or to work at all. Laptops and phones generally require a lot less intervention than cars. Some of us are happy to outsource that labour to others. Some of us are fascinated with how things work and prefer to at least try fixing things ourselves. I have learned from personal experience that Apple is outright hostile to the latter form of folk.
I fully expect an Apple car will have all manner of non-standard screws, fasteners, and parts. It will be technically possible for third party mechanics to deal with, but letting one breathe on your iBug will void the warranty. Just opening the hood will, no doubt, require special tools and break multiple tamper-proof warranty-voiding seals.
If you're happy taking your iBug into an Apple store every time you hear a new noise, you'll be fine with an iBug. If you're the sort who wants to pop the hood and try to track down the problem yourself, then beware!
[+] [-] skhameneh|3 years ago|reply
There is so much more to consider - progressing Carplay integration, demand for processing/sensing, partnerships, building knowledge, etc. Take the Sony Vision S for example, that was never intended to be a produced vehicle.
[+] [-] bottlepalm|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jononomo|3 years ago|reply
Toyota is the largest car company in the world and makes the most reliable vehicles in the world, but they need that extra touch to take them to the next level.
Just as I would never by a phone that is not an iPhone, or a laptop that is not a MacBook, I would never buy a car that is not a Toyota. But Toyota does have some room for improvement.
Also, an Apple-Toyota partnership would make Teslas look pathetic in comparison.
[+] [-] WalterBright|3 years ago|reply
Tesla is an amazing company because they achieved it.
Apple's expertise is in making software and tiny electrical gadgets. How they thought that would translate into expertise in making cars is beyond me. It makes about as much sense as diversifying into making jet engines.
[+] [-] dtagames|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rektide|3 years ago|reply
Associating yourself with automobiles doesnt feel exactly the same, but there's a similar jist to me. Cars have some very obvious bad impact on this world. Supporting & selling them is a pain. Trying to keep yourself as a loved respected treasured company would be much more difficult, quite likely impossible.
[+] [-] SV_BubbleTime|3 years ago|reply
A casual look at the numbers doesn’t explain much. But if you look at that 7% margin, and realize that Tesla is nearly doubling that with carbon credit sales which are 100% margin. It changes the picture.
Anyone else has a car they make 7% minus buying credits to be able to sell more in California. Tesla sells a car they make more. Without the carbon program Tesla would drastically have to change its model, which will be interesting because everyone is selling their own EVs and won’t need to buy as many credits soon.
It makes no sense for Apple to get into vehicles for 20 reasons, this is just one. They’re way too late.
[+] [-] tialaramex|3 years ago|reply
What I see is a career of failures, at Apple, at Be, at Palm, JLG was dealt good hands and some bad hands but played each indifferently. Did I miss something important ?
[+] [-] pram|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Tiktaalik|3 years ago|reply
Being frustrated by the driving experience and trying to solve that problem is in that category, being focused on the sort of annoyances that people spending huge amounts of time driving to Cupertino would have.
Meanwhile city governments around the US and the world are trying very hard to reduce the amount of cars on the road.
Would be nice if Apple were thinking ahead and not contributing to the entrenchment of this 20th century technology.
[+] [-] _ph_|3 years ago|reply
It just could be that. But that would depend on the car manufacturers giving up on their own software so easily and it would be a completely new strategy for Apple. They love to control the whole stack. Even in cases, where they entered a market with a collaboration - the early iPod Phones come to my mind - they later switched to their own product.
Also, the rumor about an Apple car does keep coming back. And they spend a lot of money on what ever they are doing. So while the play on just Car Play might be strong, they do have something brewing in case car manufacturers don't just jump onto it. My favorite theory though is: they are building something which will be a "car" but as different from current cars as the iPhone was from mobile phones of its day and age. I would be really curious to see that.
[+] [-] ghaff|3 years ago|reply
I was having a discussion over the weekend over where Apple goes next with respect to hardware. I think my money is on AR if the many technical limitations can be overcome. There are also the social issues but as with many other things, I suspect a lot of people would be willing to put up with even more ubiquitous cameras in exchange for convenience whether you like it or not.
[+] [-] SoftTalker|3 years ago|reply
Let someone else take the depreciation and find out how they hold up in the long term. Does Apple have any history of supporting its hardware for that long?