Author: Song Shuanghui

Since the establishment of Project Titan in 2014, Apple’s car-making has gone through 8 years. Eight years is a concept. China won the War of Resistance Against Japan in this time, but Apple’s car is still struggling in production.

However, according to the latest revelations from Bloomberg, after constantly changing its technological direction, Apple’s car project has finally made a decision – to give up on self-driving technology and focus on more affordable pricing. The earliest delivery could be in 2026.

Does this mean that after 8 years of hesitation, Tim Cook has finally understood the essence of making cars?

We have told the story of Apple’s car-making many times. Apple’s attitude towards the car-making project internally has been polarized in the past eight years. Many people are pessimistic, and the car team has even become a laughing stock because in the past eight years, apart from frequent personnel changes, Apple’s car department has not been able to produce any decent results.

CEO Cook’s indecisive attitude has made car team members feel disheartened. Cook rarely participates in the car-making project and even seldom visits the car project headquarters in Santa Clara, California.

Apple, with its huge finances, spends up to $22 billion on research and development each year, but the annual investment in the car business is only $1 billion, which does not seem to be the key business in Cook’s mind.

Moreover, to this day, Cook has not publicly acknowledged Apple’s car-making business. Internally, he is also reluctant to commit to production of this car. Since the project was established in 2014, the Apple car project has been wavering between “making hardware or software”.

Before this, Apple’s plan was to directly create a car that could achieve fully autonomous driving, the ultimate state without even a steering wheel or pedals. However, it is evident that according to the current state of the global self-driving industry, it is impossible for Apple’s self-driving car to be put into commercial production in the short term.

Therefore, the latest news indicates that Apple has given up its unrealistic fantasy and no longer wants to put a fully self-driving car into production directly. Instead, it will retain basic configurations such as steering wheels and pedals.And Apple has abandoned L5 fully autonomous driving, with the new car not even achieving L4 or L3 and only supporting fully automatic driving on highways, requiring manual driving in urban streets or in bad weather.

Looking at the autonomous driving capabilities, Apple’s new car does not seem to have anything particularly exciting, as Tesla has already achieved this level of automated assistance driving.

As for design, an internal Apple source has previously disclosed that the design of the Apple car will be very bold, with “four inward-facing seats in the car, allowing passengers to communicate with each other, and the arched roof is similar to the Volkswagen Beetle”.

Now that it has become a conventional intelligent electric car, the design of the Apple car will certainly not be so radical. However, it is reported that Apple has not yet determined the final design, and is still in the “pre-prototype” stage, with design work to be prepared next year.

As for other specifications, it is reported that the Apple car will use a powerful onboard computer system and a customized sensor array. The performance of this processor is equivalent to approximately four of Apple’s highest-end Mac chips combined.

However, unlike Tesla’s purely visual solution, Apple plans to combine the use of lidar and radar sensors, as well as camera sensors.

In addition, Apple is also exploring the idea of a remote control center that can remotely assist and control the vehicle in emergencies.

Reportedly, the design of the Apple car will be led by Ulrich Kranz, the former CEO of Canoo, and former managers from Tesla, Lamborghini, and Porsche. Software will be led by former Tesla manager Stuart Bowers, while safety engineering, testing, and regulatory issues will be led by former Ford executive Desi Ujkashevic.

After completing the design work next year, the function settings will be fully completed by the end of 2024, large-scale testing will take place in 2025, and delivery will begin in 2026, which is one year later than the original plan.

Although the advanced autonomous driving functions have been abandoned, the price of the Apple Car has also come down. Originally planned to be sold for more than $120,000, the new goal is less than $100,000, which is roughly the same price as the entry-level Tesla Model S and the Mercedes-Benz EQS.

This article is a translation by ChatGPT of a Chinese report from 42HOW. If you have any questions about it, please email bd@42how.com.