Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming • Hacker News Board

Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming

#231

Post by baron816 » Thu, May 12, 2016, 4:08 PM UTC

manmal wrote: post #206

baron816 wrote: post #200

I don't like the idea of Apple (or even Google for that matter) making cars. It seems like such a weird space for a company that makes consumer electronics parts to move into. It would be almost as weird as them starting to build houses. And I don't want to buy all my stuff from one company. Either way, I'm skeptical that any company is going to make huge, monopolistic profits from selling autonomous cars. It's somet…

Do you believe that we will have robots as shown in movies, now that Moore's law is grinding to a halt?

I don't know if it's possible to build a robot like that. Or if will take a hundred years for the technology to evolve to get to the point that will make it possible. I know currently it's not even really possible to get a robot to do a simple task like folding a towel. It'll undoubtably be extremely difficult to make something that's useful and functional. But I think Apple needs to look to something that big if it wants to grow at a fast pace again.

Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming

#232

Post by illumin8 » Thu, May 12, 2016, 4:10 PM UTC

jjuel wrote: post #197

abalone wrote: post #62

It's a car and it's not a "pivot". The Mac, iPod, iPhone, iPad, Apple TV and Watch are all about apply the same philosophy to new product categories and then tightly integrating them. At the core of it is fundamentally rethinking the interface between user and machine. With cars it makes perfect sense as long as you do one thing first: throw out everything you've read about fully autonomous cars being right around th…

"Effective autopilot assistance features can plausibly get us to 10X improvements in safety and convenience." So similar to the autopilot feature that Tesla already has in their cars? Plus it isn't going to up safety until there is 100% acceptance in this autopilot feature. Sure your car might be driving safer, but the other people who don't have these features will still be a danger to you.

Tesla's autopilot can and does increase safety even with unsafe vehicles on the road. Look at this video of a Model S moving out of the path of a truck changing lanes into it's space. The car moved before a human driver might have even had time to react.

https://www.inverse.com/article/14393-elon-musk-shares-video...

Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming

#233

Post by samsonradu » Thu, May 12, 2016, 4:14 PM UTC

Until the next big thing comes, AAPL shares just hit 2year low so people might be losing their trust/patience.

Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming

#234

Post by illumin8 » Thu, May 12, 2016, 4:15 PM UTC

untog wrote: post #36

CPLX wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But there is just no way Apple is going to beat Google to market with that technology. Why? Apple is possibly the world's most effective company at synthesizing industrial design and software in premium devices sold to consumers. Google is a web/cloud services and advertising company. The reason presumably is that you can't see what Apple is doing in public, while Google has a car that still can't drive itself in t…

For one because there is no evidence of it. Apple are secretive but at some point you have to take a car out on an actual road to see how it fares. And get government permisison to do so. The fact that Apple has done neither leads me to suspect Google is further ahead.

That's a silly assertion to make. Apple is well known for secrecy, and any prototype vehicles driving on the streets are not likely to be branded with their logo. How do you know they aren't already driving vehicles on the roads?

Also, whether they are currently road testing vehicles or not, that doesn't change the fact that Apple is increasing R&D spending.

Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming

#235

Post by ianferrel » Thu, May 12, 2016, 4:20 PM UTC

WalterBright wrote: post #201

mcphage wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Cars are a terrible industry to get into. Building cars is massively capital and plant intensive, heavily dependent on supply chain logistics, and the market is already extremely competitive. That sounds perfect for Apple, though—they've got tons of capital, excellent at supply chain logistics, and used to thriving in very competitive markets.

Many car startups have been ground to pieces due to it costing more than their investors ever imagined - Tucker, Bricklin, Delorean, etc.

How many of those car startups had the largest market cap in the world before they started making cars?

Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming

#236

Post by WalterSear » Thu, May 12, 2016, 4:20 PM UTC

potatolicious wrote: post #230

WalterSear wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

City subways systems take decades to build. Public transport is a shambles outside high density cities, and in many of those. Here in SF, it takes me an hour to get downtown by bus or subway, and 10-15 minutes by bus.

Right, but the idea is that there seems to be a large preference towards high density cities going forward, so it seems like self-driving cars improve a lifestyle that is to some degree actively being abandoned. I think OP's point is (to paraphrase) "why all this when the population is moving into high density cities where this complex infrastructure already exists and presents a superior choice to cars, self-driving…

And I'm living in a high density city, where the public transportation is barely usable.

Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming

#237

Post by swalsh » Thu, May 12, 2016, 4:24 PM UTC

baron816 wrote: post #200

I don't like the idea of Apple (or even Google for that matter) making cars. It seems like such a weird space for a company that makes consumer electronics parts to move into. It would be almost as weird as them starting to build houses. And I don't want to buy all my stuff from one company. Either way, I'm skeptical that any company is going to make huge, monopolistic profits from selling autonomous cars. It's somet…

I wouldn't be surprised if the "car" part is a commodity, and the interior/exterior are where Apple builds a better vehicle. The qualcomm chipset that powers an iphone is pretty much the same thing powering an android phone.

Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming

#238

Post by [deleted] » Thu, May 12, 2016, 4:33 PM UTC

ianferrel wrote: post #235

WalterBright wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many car startups have been ground to pieces due to it costing more than their investors ever imagined - Tucker, Bricklin, Delorean, etc.

How many of those car startups had the largest market cap in the world before they started making cars?

[deleted]

Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming

#239

Post by kamaal » Thu, May 12, 2016, 4:33 PM UTC

simonh wrote: post #219

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cars are a terrible industry to get into. Building cars is massively capital and plant intensive, heavily dependent on supply chain logistics, and the market is already extremely competitive. The entire industry is well on its way to switching to electric and/or self-driving. Selling cars requires a huge dealer network rollout with huge up-front costs for training and spares. Doing it DIY would be insanely expensive,…

The car industry is about to go through two completely independent revolutions simultaneously. The move to electric power trains, and self-driving. This is the perfect time for an outsider to enter the market because the incumbents have no advantage in these fields relative to a newcomer. In fact as fundamentally hardware companies they have the same issues with figuring out how to develop first class software that t…

>>specifically battery technology on the power train side and software on the self-driving side.

Neither actually.

Battery technology for cars is a very different area of work compared to making battery for phones.

And writing self driving car algorithms isn't exactly the same designing UI on the FreeBSD OS.

Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming

#240

Post by JBReefer » Thu, May 12, 2016, 4:37 PM UTC

bidatzi wrote: post #105

_ph_ wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But they are also growing by about 50% year over year (and more!). In 2015 they sold as many cars as Porsche sold in 2000, this year probably as much as Porsche in 2004. Tesla is spending every dollar they can get hold of into growth. The preorders for the Model 3 equal a possible revenue of 15 Billion alone.

Sales went up 50% YoY. Loses went up 83% YoY.

They have the Bank of Musk, which is a massive advantage. Apple does have all of that cash on hand, though, so that's less of an advantage if they are truly working on a car.