Written by / Windsor
Editor/ Zhang Nan
Design / Zhao Haoran
On the evening of March 15, Guo Mingxi, a well-known analyst at Tianfeng International Securities, broke the news on social media: Apple's auto team has been disbanded for a while. If you want to mass-produce Apple Car in 2025, you need to reorganize your team within 3 to 6 months. Prior to this, he had predicted the launch time of Apple Cars several times, from 2025, 2027, and then to 2028.
The industry praised as "the strongest Apple analyst on the surface" shortly before the news, there is news that Apple is cooperating with the South Korean company OSAT to develop a chip for Apple Car's self-driving function.
When Apple Auto CEO Tim Cook took the stage to make the official announcement, no one knew when Apple Cars would be released, or simply whether they would be released.
But people have a hard time resisting the temptation of apples. Even though there are already hundreds of electric cars on the market, the idea of owning an Apple Car is always appealing. In recent years, iPhone sales have stabilized, and Apple also needs to come up with an epoch-making product that has shocked the world.
For competitors, the golden signboard of Apple on the top of the head and the design and technology aura accumulated by the brand for many years, when even the shadow has not been seen, the four words of Apple Car are enough to make other brands sleepless all night. Li Bin, the founder of Weilai Automobile, once said that the ultimate opponent of Weilai Automobile is Apple.
For seven years, from time to time, news of Apple Cars came out, and from the lock films of these news, we pieced together a panorama of Apple Cars.
Apple's "three in and three out" of the car
People have almost never heard of any official news, and Apple has always been vague about building cars.
In February 2015, it was revealed that Apple was working on cars. For a while, everyone was talking about the prospects for Apple cars.
According to the Wall Street Journal, the iCar project, code-named Titan, initially involved hundreds of employees; at that time, it was only certain that Apple was researching related technologies in the automotive field, and did not know that it was just developing software, or that it was ready to build a car.
Tony Fadell, a former senior vice president of Apple and known as the "father of the iPod", revealed in an interview that he had repeatedly discussed the possibility of building a car with Apple founder Steve Jobs; another Apple vice president of marketing, Phil Schiller, also confirmed that Apple had actually considered building a car before releasing the iPhone in 2007.
In the gossip, Apple never admitted to building a car. The only time bloomberg interviewed Tim Cook in June 2017 revealed in a rare way that Apple was developing self-driving technology, "The development of autonomous driving systems is the mother of all AI projects, but this work is probably one of the most difficult AI projects to advance." He said.
However, in an interview in 2021, Cook had refused to respond to the host's question about building the car.
In May 2018, apple and Volkswagen had news of cooperation, but it was not the legendary driverless car, but an unmanned shuttle bus that ferry employees to and from work. After a series of technical difficulties and frictions, the cooperation between the two companies also failed.
The news of Apple's car construction came again in July 2019, when the FBI captured a former Apple employee accused him of stealing the company's trade secrets, including "wiring harness assembly drawings designed by Apple for self-driving cars." Not only does the case show that the car project is underway, FBI documents also show that About 5,000 people at Apple have been involved in the project.
The news that Apple was building a car finally had a hammer, but in the same year, there were reports that Apple had fired 200 people working in the Titan program. As things seemed to end, Apple acquired a self-driving company on the verge of bankruptcy Drive.ai.
At the end of 2020, Apple's car construction heated up again, Reuters quoted intelligence from "people familiar with the matter" as saying that in December 2020, the Titan project restarted. In January 2021, a Bloomberg report claimed that a team within Apple was working on "powertrain, vehicle interior and exterior body design," not just autonomous driving systems.
This time, there are rumors of dissolution, and Apple's car can be described as a twist and turn.
The person in charge is like a marquee, and the team has changed blood
The turmoil in Apple's car project has long been foreshadowed.
In January 2022, Joe Bass, head of software engineering project management for Apple's automotive team, changed LinkedIn data, confirming that he had left Apple for seven years to join Apple's old rival Meta as director of VR technology project management.
According to the timeline of Apple's car, Buzz is a veteran figure. Bloomberg columnist Mark Gurman noted, "With Bath's departure, the Apple auto management team from a year ago has fallen apart. ”
Prior to that, Apple had lost several generals, namely: Dave Scott, head of robotics engineering; Jaime Waydo, head of autonomous driving safety and regulation; Dave Rosenthal, head of autonomous driving engineering; and Benjamin Lyon, head of sensors.
The wave of departures began in September 2021, when Doug Field, Apple's vice president of special projects, announced the addition of Ford Motor, who is the leader of several of the departing executives. In December, Michael Schwekutsch, Apple's head of hardware programs, also announced his departure.
In the same article, Gurman noted, "More than 100 Apple employees have 'defected' to Meta in the past few months, and Apple will certainly find a way to stop this number from growing." ”
From 2014 to 2021, the titan project leader has changed by 5 people like a marquee.
In 2014, the Apple auto project was launched under former Ford engineer Steve Zadesky, who was director of the iPhone and iPod. Later, the project was run by dan Riccio, the former head of the hardware division, followed by Bob Mansfield and former Tesla high-pipe Ge Feld.
After Field left the company, the leadership of the Titan project fell into the hands of Kevin Lynch. Unlike the four previous leaders, Lynch has neither strong expertise nor experience in the automotive field. His achievements are what has made the Apple Watch an indispensable device for receiving messages and health monitoring from a product with no clear purpose.
When Lynch took office, he laid out a whole new and unique direction for the project: a fully autonomous car with no steering wheels and pedals. In the Apple Empire, such personnel changes cannot be avoided.
Lynch was also paired with an executive with an automotive background. In late 2020, John Giannandrea, Apple's senior vice president of machine learning and AI strategy, was named head of automotive programs, reporting directly to Cook.
From the current point of view, the two outsiders have joined forces to change the team of Apple car manufacturing, the next step is to give up or nirvana, Gurman pointed out, "2022 is the year that determines the success or failure of Apple's car project." ”
Who will produce Apple cars
If it continues to build, will Apple choose a partner? Compared with the design of mobile phones, the development of cars is more complex and difficult, the investment is not cheap, especially the platform architecture of the car, it is an extremely important and expensive problem, if you develop from scratch, it means a huge waste.
Apple is a successful tech company, not a manufacturing giant. At the beginning of 2021, the news that Apple and Hyundai are ready to cooperate and the cooperation breaks down has made headlines twice.
There are rumors that Apple has also approached at least six Japanese automakers about partnerships and manufacturing possibilities. Honda, Nissan and Mazda declined to comment, while Mitsubishi bitterly denied the possibility.
In addition, Apple has been in contact with Nissan, but due to differences in details, the negotiations were only short-lived and did not reach the executive level. Nissan feared that Apple would see itself as a hardware supplier, while Apple wanted complete control over the car's design and software components, and the talks broke down again.
The differences are simple and clear. Apple doesn't want to use manufacturing giants like Foxconn or Magna to produce cars, but wants to find a mature car manufacturer that is willing to let itself control hardware and software, but these manufacturers that have a glorious history in the era of traditional fuel vehicles are not willing to become "suppliers", even Apple.
The discussion about who will make Apple cars is after Apple will build cars, but what we can know now is that the list of broken relations with Apple already includes Volkswagen, Hyundai, Nissan, electric car manufacturer Canopy...
The sense of crisis of the fruit chain giants
Apple makes cars, and what is more exciting than fruit powder is the suppliers on the fruit chain.
While the initial signs suggested that Apple wanted to find a whole new partner to build a car, the suppliers who followed Apple to make a lot of money didn't want to get out.
Foxconn, one of Apple's largest foundries, is extremely active in the automotive industry. On October 18, 2021, Foxconn's parent company Hon Hai Precision officially released the pure electric vehicle brand Foxtron and brought 3 new cars.
In addition to car manufacturing, Foxconn is also actively trying to provide oem services for automobile companies. In January of the same year, Foxconn and Geely signed a strategic cooperation agreement to establish a joint venture to provide foundry production and customized consulting services for global automotive and mobility companies. In February, Foxconn announced that it had signed a memorandum of understanding with Fisker, a start-up battery-powered car company in the United States, to manufacture Fisker brand electric vehicle products.
Going back further, Foxconn invested a total of 1 billion yuan with Tencent and Harmony Automobile in 2015 to create the Internet car-making project "Harmony Futeng", which is the predecessor of Byton Automobile. In 2021, Foxconn has also set out to prepare to take over byton Motors, which is struggling on the brink of life and death, as an opportunity to enter new energy vehicles.
Hon Hai Precision founder Terry Gou once said at an internal meeting, "If we can make iPhones, why can't we make electric cars?" A car is an iPhone with four wheels. ”
Compared with the car dream explanation, lending public opinion is more biased towards Foxconn to build cars more for Apple cars to pave the way, in advance to strengthen the foundry strength of new energy vehicles, once Apple announces car manufacturing, Foxconn is expected to rely on the past relationship and has accumulated experience, near the water tower to win the Apple car OEM contract.
Also taking a similar path with Foxconn is Luxshare Precision. On February 11, the fruit chain giant issued an announcement that the company intends to jointly establish a joint venture with Chery Group and Chery New Energy. To this end, Lixun Precision spent 10.054 billion yuan to acquire 19.88% of the shares of Chery Holdings held by Qingdao Wudaokou, becoming its fourth largest shareholder.
Luxshare Precision, established in 2004, started with the production and sales of connectors, and later developed into a precision component foundry business of computer Internet mobile phone products, the highest period of market value has reached 400 billion yuan, currently hovering at 300 billion yuan, although the company's development is stable, but also need to find new growth points.
Wang Laichun, chairman and general manager of its company, said that Lixun Precision does not build complete vehicles, but cooperates with Chery New Energy to develop the ODM business (original design manufacturer) that builds good cars for others, and aims to seize the window of opportunity to enter the world's leading Tier1 (first-tier supplier).
According to the current global hot car building situation, with the aura of Apple suppliers overhead, even if they fail to win the big order of Apple cars, the fruit chain giants have found a new way out for themselves.
Mysterious Apple Cars
At the beginning of 2022, Apple launched an official original movie "Swan Elegy", which showed that any peer-to-peer automatic driving, no steering wheel, and in-car interaction all rely on AR headsets to unfold, full of futuristic technology. The outside world exclaimed, this may be what Apple cars look like.
From the beginning to the present, we are all looking for apple cars from clues, but Apple's secrecy work is too good to hide only patent applications.
In 2020, Apple filed a patent for a color-changing window. The system can operate on its own to collect environmental data to adjust the color depth of the glass, such as sunny days or haze and other different conditions, the system will automatically adjust, or set by the owner himself.
Interestingly, according to another patent filed by Apple in 2018, the car of the future may not have windows, displays and virtual reality systems that can present real or "artificial" surroundings to passengers.
Apple's patent also includes a new on-board lighting technology that can illuminate any corner of the car such as fabric seats, door panels, dashboards, etc., and can project patterns or text on the surface of objects, the biggest use is to facilitate drivers and passengers to pick up items in the car at night.
In another patent, Apple canceled the physical wrapping of the seat, added a new motor and sensors inside, and formed an adaptive seat suspension system and an electric puller system to achieve adaptive control tension on the surface of the seat cover.
In addition to comfort, the safety of the car is even more important. Apple's safety patents cover seat belts and roof-mounted airbags. In short, a large airbag is installed on the roof of the car, and when a collision occurs, the airbag can be deployed in front of the passenger seat, and the waist restraint will also pop out a large inflatable module.
Apple makes cars, and the sense of technology is the least to worry about. The patent shows that Apple has embedded an application program called "CarKey" in the iOS system, making it possible for mobile phones to replace car keys.
So far, almost all indications are that Apple's goal is to launch a self-driving car that allows motorists to "drive little or little" after entering their destinations. It is reported that Apple cars will not rely on the steering wheel to control, not even the brake throttle, the whole process through voice commands or gestures to drive.
Bloomberg emphasized in an article that the direction of Apple's car is not simply to match existing electric vehicles with autonomous driving capabilities, but to surpass the electric vehicle market through a true autonomous driving.
As for the battery part of another core of electric vehicles, Reuters reported that Apple's battery technology is a unique single battery design that allows all cells to be directly integrated together, eliminating the waste of space that exists between the individual cells of traditional battery packs. In this way, more battery materials can be used in the same space to achieve greater endurance.
An Apple employee once couldn't bear to show off to the media, "Apple's battery technology is definitely the product of the next level, just like the level of surprise you were when you first saw the iPhone." ”
All in all, Apple has more than 200 patents that can be related to cars, most of which sound very cool, but like most patents, we are not sure that Apple will add these technologies to car products, so everything about Apple cars is just a fantasy.
But one thing is certain, if Apple makes cars, it will almost inevitably be deeply integrated with the iOS system, which means that in a way, the iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch and even Mac that we have now may play a major role in the function of the vehicle.
"Apple's ecosystem can all be seamlessly integrated into Apple-specific cars." Auto analyst Ram put it bluntly, "No other company except Google can match it." ”
Kuo has said that Apple cars will be Apple's "next star product" because Apple is able to offer "better hardware, software and service integration" than potential competitors in the automotive market.
He also mentioned another issue that is most relevant to the outside world – price. Guo Mingxi pointed out that the apple car that will eventually be listed is "very high-end", and the price is higher than that of other electric vehicles, and there is a significant market gap. In any case, apples are apples. No matter what the Apple car looks like, it can't be cheaper.
The secret base of Apple Cars
In February 2016, residents near Sunnyvale, California, complained that they could often hear something like "motor noise" at night.
"Every night at 11 p.m. there is a noise similar to a car? It can still be heard even when the windows are closed. Local residents said. At that time, some people speculated that this may be the sound of lathes and rolling mills working, and that Apple was conducting local car-building experiments.
As mysterious as Apple's car is its secret base for research and development.
Flipping through the apple-related reports, everything points to Sunnyvale, which is only a ten-minute drive from Cupertino, Apple's silicon valley base.
Apple rented some of the sites in Sunnyvale that were allowed by the urban planning department to build "automatic workspaces" and "maintenance garages," and also bought properties, one of which was once a Pepsi bottling plant.
Several buildings that have potential links to the Apple car project have secret names of their interiors, named after Zeus, Leah, and Athena from Greek mythology, and the connection between them and the Titans, also from Greek mythology, is self-evident.
It's unclear whether the rumors of Sunnyvale's car project are accurate, but there is news that apple car development work is indeed taking place at secret locations outside apple headquarters.
Apple's building drawings to city officials indicate that a facility in Sunnyvale, code-named "Rhea," will be engaged in car-related activities, using car-related words such as "lubricants," "wheel balancers," "tire changers," and "wheels."
In addition, there are rumors that Apple will operate a secret car research and development laboratory in Berlin. The factory is said to employ 15 to 20 men and women from the German automotive industry, all with backgrounds in engineering, software, hardware and sales. Lab staff are known in their respective fields as "opinion leaders with innovative thinking."
Not only that, Apple leased a large manufacturing facility in Milpitas, California, at the end of 2018. It's unclear what Apple intends to use the site for. But speculation may be related to the auto project.
The richest apple
People are full of expectations for Apple cars, one of the reasons is that Apple's consistent product release idea is not to be loud, a blockbuster.
Imad Khan, the editor of the tomsguide.com website, believes that Apple cars will not be released until they are ready. The approach Apple often takes when developing new products can be summed up as slow and steady. Before releasing a product, Apple usually chooses to take a step back and evaluate the market, carefully dissect the problem areas and look for ways to improve, and the iPhone is the best proof.
If Apple had wanted to, Apple could have made a phone in 2005 to compete with The BlackBerry. But Apple chose to focus on redesigning the phone rather than iterating on the currently available version.
The iPhone ushered in an era, so people expected Apple to do the same thing in the automotive world.
What's more, Apple has money.
Apple has always been one of the brands with the highest cash reserves in the world, holding about $100 billion at the end of 2020 and continuing to grow. On January 4, 2022, Apple's market value once exceeded $3 trillion, which is equivalent to about 19 trillion yuan, which is not exaggerated to describe it as a rich country.
Building a car is a costly thing. Morgan Stanley analyst Katie Huberty had expected Apple to spend $19 billion on car research and development in 2020, compared with $80 billion to $100 billion spent on research and development in the auto industry as a whole.
Money means talent. In July 2015, Doug Bates, who had 25 years of experience with Nissan and Toyota, joined Apple; in the same year, the Korea Times said that Apple was recruiting battery technology experts from Samsung Group, and an unnamed person revealed that Apple offered extremely generous salaries and benefits.
Also in this year, Apple was sued by battery manufacturer A123 Systems for "digging too hard", which said that Apple's behavior hindered the progress of the company's current battery project, and it was difficult for the poached employees to find alternatives because of their high professionalism. It is reported that Apple will "connect the pot end" of the company's five core R & D personnel.
Something similar happened to electric motorcycle startup Mission Motors, which indirectly led to the closure of the startup as Apple recruited six employees.
It is difficult to summarize the law from various news, Apple's "digging and digging" style is eclectic, from the traditional car companies Ford, General Motors, Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz to the technology company BlackBerry, from large companies to startups, and so on.
In apple's recruitment process, Tesla is a hard hit area. According to incomplete statistics, Apple has poached more than 300 people from Tesla, and the targets cover various positions such as executives, engineers, designers, and technicians. Doug Field, one of the titan project leaders who has left his job, joined Apple from Tesla in 2018.
Tesla CEO Musk has revealed that Apple has worked hard to recruit Tesla engineers, providing them with a $250,000 signing bonus and a 60% salary increase.
For Apple's poaching behavior, Musk responded, "Apple recruited people who were fired by Tesla, if employees can't get mixed in Tesla, they can go to Apple." ”
Apple has shown, both past and present, that it does have enough money and potential to develop a successful product.
Apple's battle with Tesla
Yesterday you ignored me, today I made you unable to climb high.
Musk has revealed that he approached Cook during the darkest days of Tesla's Model 3 project and discussed the possibility of letting Apple buy Tesla, but Cook declined his invitation to meet.
Now, Tesla is frequently drawn to compare itself with the never-before-seen Apple car.
Alan Gordon, a senior reporter for VICE Magazine, doesn't expect Apple cars because Tesla has disrupted the industry and Apple hasn't surprised the tech industry for a while. There is also a lot of anti-human design in the product, for example, to charge the mouse needs to turn the mouse over, which means that the mouse cannot be used during charging.
"In the absence of breakthroughs in its products, Apple, like many others, profits through unfriendly markup sales and accessories." Gordon said.
With tesla or Apple questioning who will be the best game of chess, AutoMotive Business Review interviewed car owners, experts and industry insiders.
A Tesla car that has used an Apple mobile phone for ten years is the main force to support Tesla, Tesla is nothing remarkable, but he is not looking forward to Apple Cars at all, "If Apple's current products are used as a standard to extend the comparison, Apple has no subversive products in other fields in addition to the mobile phone field." ”
In the process of use, the owner is most satisfied with Tesla's autopilot technology, "Tesla's autopilot technology has the function of self-learning and evolution, the more data, the smarter the car." With the expansion of the product base, a large number of Teslas driving on the road provide nutrients for their self-learning, and according to this trend, Tesla will certainly be more powerful in a few years. ”
Interestingly, just a few days before the interview, the owner had already replaced the Tesla Model 3 with the Nio ES6.
Zhang Xiaoliang, founder & CEO of SoCar Product Strategy Consulting, also emphasized Tesla's first-mover advantage, saying that he did not understand Apple's products, but Apple is no longer a startup company, and it is difficult to make real essential changes by using the logic of non-startup companies to enter a new industry. In contrast, Tesla has formed a complete car-making system, far ahead.
Jia Ke, editor-in-chief of Automotive Business Review, believes that the two have their own strengths, and Apple's future will bring surprises in terms of interactivity, design and visual system, but in terms of self-driving, it is difficult for Apple to surpass Tesla, "We now have to foresee something that has not yet happened, which is difficult." But the flow of people between Apple and Tesla makes there may be some similarities between the two. He said.
Another industry insider who has just booked the Tesla Model 3 is also a "centrist", and he believes that neither company will make car building the only thing to do, but part of its grand strategy.
"Tesla is involved in the charging system, energy storage system, and even rocket satellite field; Apple has a perfect IT software and hardware ecology, and the car is just a new terminal like iPhone and iPad, seamlessly connecting people's lives through Apple." Neither of them confines themselves to the automotive industry, and dreams or responsibilities push them forward, pushing technology beyond imagination, rather than just competing for positions in the automotive industry. ”
Tesla's ultimate showdown with Apple is something to look forward to, and apple cars will have to hold on until that day comes.
This article was originally produced by Automotive Business Review
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