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Apple to wind down electric car effort after decadelong odyssey

bloomberg.com

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Re: Apple to wind down electric car effort after decadelong odyssey

#581

Post by anonylizard »

pquki4 wrote: post #559
tibbar wrote: post #545

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is more overlap between the two than you'd think, specifically in producing and evaluating datasets for training and fine-tuning models. Most software engineers and ML engineers who worked on self-driving cars would do fine at working on GenAI; in fact, they're more qualified than the vast majority of engineers to work in a brand-new industry. Same goes for engineers working on compute hardware. Even engineers…

The question is: does Apple actually need so many people working on GenAI? Would a team with 300 people be twice as good as a team with 150 people for what Apple is going to release as products? I wouldn't be surprised if Apple is going to lay off most of them.

Wow, skimping on 150 people for the biggest change to the tech industry in since the invention of the computer.

You understand Apple spent like billions for this electric car industry that never produced anything? Why would they want to starve the AI project now?

You understand how many people in Microsoft and Google are working on AI adjacent projects? Even if they aren't AI researchers, there's tons of work just to put the models in useful applications.

Re: Apple to wind down electric car effort after decadelong odyssey

#582

Post by strangattractor »

ProfessorLayton wrote: post #168

To be honest, I'm not sure what Apple could've brought to the table in regards to making an electric car. Apple's hardware design philosophies[1] don't really align with what consumers want in a car. Apple being less minimalistic than a Tesla — which is already at an extreme — is a hard sell. [1] Examples of what I mean: - Cars use faux materials all the time for cost and weight purposes, or even just looks (i.e. fak…

I don't know - maybe a really thin aluminum car would be easier to park or something;)

Re: Apple to wind down electric car effort after decadelong odyssey

#583

Post by jaimex2 »

Called it for years. Apple had long had the reputation as being the Tesla reject bin, if you got fired that's where you would go.

Their self driving will go nowhere also unless they buy someone out. They aren't an AI company and they don't have access to meaningful data.

Re: Apple to wind down electric car effort after decadelong odyssey

#586

Post by ahefner »

ProfessorLayton wrote: post #168

To be honest, I'm not sure what Apple could've brought to the table in regards to making an electric car. Apple's hardware design philosophies[1] don't really align with what consumers want in a car. Apple being less minimalistic than a Tesla — which is already at an extreme — is a hard sell. [1] Examples of what I mean: - Cars use faux materials all the time for cost and weight purposes, or even just looks (i.e. fak…

> ...or even just looks (i.e. fake chrome bits, spoilers and vents that don't do anything etc.)

Yes, and such decisions exemplify the horrible taste of many car designs, designers, and possibly buyers.

Re: Apple to wind down electric car effort after decadelong odyssey

#587

Post by kjreact »

i_have_an_idea wrote: post #455
kjreact wrote: post #395

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So, the people that failed to build a car, when Tesla, Xiaomi, BYD and half a dozen tech startups succeeded, will now fail to build generative AI. I don’t work at Apple (so I don’t know for certain), but I don’t think the point of the Apple Car was ever to just copy the industry and produce an EV; it was to reach the holy grail of a fully autonomous vehicle, which no manufacturer has been able to successfully build…

I get what you're saying, however I don't think that's true: > the goal was to reach the holy grail of a fully autonomous vehicle Otherwise, why release a device like the Apple Vision Pro? It's also very far from the holy grail of AR/VR. It's very heard to beat the state of the art. It's almost impossible to surpass it by some unbelievable margin. It seems very unlikely that fully autonomous driving was the goalpost…

In 2016 the Lyft cofounder predicted that by 2021 the majority of their network would be fully autonomous. The general public was led to believe that the technology was close to fruition. Apple execs having similar aspirations at the time makes sense. But we now know that that prediction isn’t coming true any time soon.

I’m not sure why everyone thinks that Apple only wanted to create an EV to compete with Tesla or BYD. Given that the Apple execs thought that fully autonomous driving was achievable, it’s possible that Apple wanted to introduce a mobile entertainment pod-type product which may have been relatively lucrative as a premium luxury product at first and later could have become a good product for keeping mindshare when the general public used it for their daily two hour commutes.

But after COVID started the work from home movement, Apple pivoting to a product like Apple Vision Pro makes more sense when the importance of commuting lessened. Peering backwards in time the decisions that Apple made look logical. Now whether Apple can monetize generative AI by leveraging their iDevices market share will determine whether they can make it to a 4T market cap. Apple has a tough mountain to climb going forward since none of these products are sure hits like the iPhone was.

Re: Apple to wind down electric car effort after decadelong odyssey

#588

Post by NoPicklez »

coldtea wrote: post #506
evan_ wrote: post #490

If I were running a successful company I would stay as far away from selling cars as possible- it can't imagine how bad it is for PR (not to mention your psyche) to suddenly have "Family killed by drunk driver" headlines with a giant color picture of your flagship product, blood-stained and mangled below it.

That's a strange thought. Neither the name or logo of famous car brands got associated or tarnished by tens of thousands killed every year... Even when some of them ocassionally made a specific "death trap" model or production run, that's simply not how people thinks of them.

People don't think that way generally about cars where humans have historically been in complete control, because we associate that with our own driving experience and we're conditioned to it. When it comes to a car brand where crashes occur due to autonomous driving that's different.

It's all about timing and the brand.

Apple coming into the car market will have the same media scrutiny as Tesla. There might be 1000s of Toyota motor vehicle accidents weekly, but if there's one involving a Tesla and particularly one driving autonomously, you can bet it will be on the front page.

It's an enormous PR challenge for Apple if one of their cars kills someone, especially in any autonomous mode. They likely won't be about to stop that from happening completely but either way it's still a challenge they will need to deal with.

Finally, Apple historically have not been associated with building high speed vehicles that can kill people. That is an inherent risk if you are entering the market as purely a car maker.

Re: Apple to wind down electric car effort after decadelong odyssey

#589

Post by dorkwood »

nightfly wrote: post #4
riddlemethat wrote: post #3

This is a smart move. Apple seems so far behind in generative AI it's making Google look innovative.

Why does everyone have to it?

If developers weren't tripping over themselves to inject it into every single app that exists, there would be no reason to. But they are, so there is.

Re: Apple to wind down electric car effort after decadelong odyssey

#590

Post by SheinhardtWigCo »

anonylizard wrote: post #581
pquki4 wrote: post #559

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The question is: does Apple actually need so many people working on GenAI? Would a team with 300 people be twice as good as a team with 150 people for what Apple is going to release as products? I wouldn't be surprised if Apple is going to lay off most of them.

Wow, skimping on 150 people for the biggest change to the tech industry in since the invention of the computer. You understand Apple spent like billions for this electric car industry that never produced anything? Why would they want to starve the AI project now? You understand how many people in Microsoft and Google are working on AI adjacent projects? Even if they aren't AI researchers, there's tons of work just to…

More cooks does not a delicious meal make.
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