… it looks like you’re out of luck:
Good. Apple should stick to their core business. Seeding an industry they know nothing about might create another one of these…
A car designed by computer people, not car people…
Notice how much it looks like @texases kid’s car
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Funny guy…
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Presents an embarrassing situation for Apple management. Better to stop now than to wait on a hope I guess. Maybe someday a project history will be published, should make interesting reading.
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There’s only one car I’m waiting for, and it sounds like I will be waiting a long time, as the model reveal was actually an April Fool’s Day joke back in 2019. I am, of course, talking about the announced revival of the Plymouth nameplate, and re-release of their legendary economy car. An Apple self-driving car??? You can keep that.
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A VERY long time, IMHO.
Perhaps… infinity?
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And what would that be?
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Phones, computers and cloud storage…
And lets not forget ITunes. Apple has changed their core a few times over the decades. They are a technology company. I wouldn’t limit them to one or even 4 technologies. To stay in business they will always need to keep finding new venues. They wouldn’t be the company they are if they just stayed at their original core (computers).
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True enough. I recall when mp3-format audio was new, used mostly by hobbiests and experimenters, Apple began some work on mp3 products. Some “experts” in the valley were skeptical of the merit of that pursuit. It of course turned out to be pretty important.
As an Apple fan… I think their version of a pure electric car would have been interesting.
Having said that, and having read a bio of Elon Musk recently… I suspect Apple’s task got seriously “muddled” by the Rubik’s Cube of auto/self driving and car manufacturing. Nobody’s been able to solve those issues yet, at least not new entrants. Personally I think Apple would’ve been better off just buying Tesla, if electric cars were truly the direction they wanted to go in.
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They could make luggage. The I BAG.
There is nothing wrong with trying to expand the markets they serve. The issue seems to be less about technology and more about slowing expansion of the BEV market. According to the article read this morning, Apple hired several automotive executives and engineers to work on the program. It’s not like they intended to get into the BEV market with their veteran staff alone.
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I agree the softening of the BEV market is a key part of Apple’s decision.
You definitely can hire the expertise but building cars is clearly difficult and the competition for the expertise was pretty strong. Apple isn’t really a manufacturing company since they outsource. That may also have been an issue with lack of expertise.
Fisker is currently trying outsourcing their car to Magna with some issues. Lordstown motors tried to build their own and that didn’t succeed either sooo, its a tough business to break into.
Another issue for Apple is the possible arrival of Chinese BEVs in the US. The Secretary of Transportation announced that they will block importation of Chinese BEVs, saying that it’s a security risk for Chinese EVs to spy on Americans. BYD wants to build an assembly plant in Mexico, and I assume that is the response to barring direct importation. It seems to me that preventing the sale of BYD cars built in Mexico would not work given current commerce rules. The good news for some Americans is that BEVs would cost thousands less. The bad news for some Americans is that the American automobile industry will eventually shrink if they can’t respond with similarly priced products.
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Their business model is often to invent and patent the the product like the car, but never actually build it.
The operative word there is YET. There have been tremendous strides in autonomous vehicles in the past 5 years. We have vehicles that are now at level 3. Truly autonomous is considered level 5. Engineering takes time. Not going to happen over night. I’ve worked on much smaller projects tha took many engineers a decade to solve. But we did solve it.
Whose business model?
Apple.
Getting to 10 characters.