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Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming

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Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming

#241

Post by mindslight »

bresc wrote: post #216

I have to ask: Why cars? Why are Google, Tesla and now Apple supposedly investing in cars? From the European point of view cars seem to be a dead end. More and more people live in an urban area and more and more young people use public transportation way more often, than cars. Additionally carsharing makes owning a car in a german city kinda obsolete. So... why cars?

> More and more people live in an urban area and more and more young people use public transportation way more often, than cars. Additionally carsharing makes owning a car in a german city kinda obsolete.

It is this. What you're missing is that in the whole wide US, the number of European-density cities where most people can choose to forgo routine use of a car can be counted on one's fingers. The common layout here is a few walkable commercial blocks "downtown", that generally serve as single-destination stops for drivers who live further out.

Self driving is what's required to make the car sharing frictionless and on-demand in less-dense areas. Currently this role is being done with human owner/operators; replacing the humans with software will reduce prices and consolidate ownership of capital equipment. (Interestingly enough, it will also decrease the stickiness of supply. Instead of needing to slowly recruit driver mindshare for a new intermediary, a straightforward investment in a fleet of cars suffices)

That being said, I think this article is a bit hokey. Apple "pivot"? mm hmm.

Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming

#242

Post by greedo »

abalone wrote: post #140
iSnow wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Unless you change the only fundamental aspects of owning a car (driving, parking, and maintenance), all you're doing is polishing a turd. I guess the real disruption in the automotive sector would be a focus on mobility instead of owning a car. Have a smartphone app where you could call a shared car from wherever you are whenever you wanted. It appears 10m later, takes you to your destination and then goes back into…

That service is available. You've exactly described Uber. Driverless cars would be (further) disruptive but only if driverless cars are actually possible. That is mostly a tech press peak hype cycle fantasy right now. Even Google made a public statement throwing cold water on that, saying it could take 30 years. Meanwhile the disruption we could actually face is with 10X improvements in safety and comfort via semi- a…

Careful, your karma might not take the hit from the autonomous driving crowds at HN. I keep looking at the state of the art systems for autonomous vehicles, and shake my head. I don't expect to see them in use in the US in any serious numbers before I die. The obstacles are just too complex/difficult. We always denigrate people's intelligence, but the human mind is pretty incredible at processing things spatially, even when distracted in a minivan hurtling down an Interstate.

Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming

#243

Post by kamaal »

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…

>>It seems like such a weird space for a company that makes consumer electronics parts to move into

Actually if you think of a car as a consumer electronic device, it doesn't seem weird at all!

Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming

#244

Post by kamaal »

CPLX wrote: post #27
darawk wrote: post #16

Is this a surprise? Isn't it well known that Apple is working on a car? I think the big question here is not are they working on a car, but can they deliver a car that represents a significant improvement over what's out there. And that i'm highly skeptical of, unless they deliver full autonomy. But there is just no way Apple is going to beat Google to market with that technology. So, I agree they're working on a car…

> 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…

>>Google is a web/cloud services and advertising company.

Google is actually an AI company.

Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming

#245

Post by rgbrenner »

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…

the incumbents have no advantage in these fields relative to a newcomer.

Except their distribution network, reputation/brand value, and marketing reach. And their IP in the non-powertrain components. And their manufacturing knowledge which makes the cars more reliable.

And they can fund the move to electric (or whatever) using existing profits. Whereas any newcomer has to raise money and spend time doing all of these things.

While this is probably the best time for someone to attempt to do those things.. the incumbents definitely aren't starting from scratch.. they still have advantages.

Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming

#246

Post by vlozko »

swalsh wrote: post #237
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.

Not correct. Apple designs their own SoCs. Samsung and TSMC manufacture them. Really, the only thing in common is that they're both using ARM as the instruction set.

Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming

#247

Post by splouk »

rgbrenner wrote: post #245
simonh wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

the incumbents have no advantage in these fields relative to a newcomer. Except their distribution network, reputation/brand value, and marketing reach. And their IP in the non-powertrain components. And their manufacturing knowledge which makes the cars more reliable. And they can fund the move to electric (or whatever) using existing profits. Whereas any newcomer has to raise money and spend time doing all of these…

Except Apple would already have reputation/brand value as well. Perhaps even more than, say Ford, since they are known as a technology company, and the cars of the future are electric and self-driving.

Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming

#248

Post by aetherson »

sixQuarks wrote: post #221
bresc wrote: post #216

I have to ask: Why cars? Why are Google, Tesla and now Apple supposedly investing in cars? From the European point of view cars seem to be a dead end. More and more people live in an urban area and more and more young people use public transportation way more often, than cars. Additionally carsharing makes owning a car in a german city kinda obsolete. So... why cars?

There is a contrarian argument that self-driving cars will actually INCREASE the demand for vehicles. If a vehicle is self-driving, it can not only act as a taxi, but also act as cargo transporter, delivery guy, etc.

It's not really that much of a contrarian argument.

Basically, here's the deal:

Right now, the cost to own a car is CO and the value received from owning a car is VO.

The cost to rent cars from a taxi-like service is CR and the value received from renting cars in a taxi-like service is VR.

For most people, CO The VO and VR relationship is much more complex. There are advantages of each model (you can take an Uber when you're drunk, you don't have to look for parking, but on the other hand you can't leave your crap in it and you have to wait for it to arrive and you can't take your kid in it).

Based on the CO VR distribution across people, we have a certain balance where taxi-like services are pretty big, but ownership is the dominant model.

In the autonomous world, VO > VR almost all the time. That is, you get all the advantages of current ownership and pretty much all the advantages of current rental. But the cost of ownership presumably increases (you have to pay for a sensor package now) and the cost of renting presumably decreases (since you no longer have to pay for a driver). So the question is how much do those costs end up changing? Is the sensor package expensive or cheap? How many human costs can the Ubers of the autonomous world actually cut out, and how much utilization can they get out of each car? If the CO increase is small enough or the VO decrease is small enough, you expect to see more car ownership. If not, more car rental.

Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming

#249

Post by simonh »

rgbrenner wrote: post #245
simonh wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

the incumbents have no advantage in these fields relative to a newcomer. Except their distribution network, reputation/brand value, and marketing reach. And their IP in the non-powertrain components. And their manufacturing knowledge which makes the cars more reliable. And they can fund the move to electric (or whatever) using existing profits. Whereas any newcomer has to raise money and spend time doing all of these…

You are absolutely correct, it will be a tough challenge, but if anyone is ever going to it, it's now.

Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming

#250

Post by groby_b »

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #160
simonh wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the phone industry just didn't think it possible that real ground breaking innovation in their industry was at all possible. They imagined a phone must have a physical keyboard, couldn't run a decent web browser and Microsoft was already selling the best mobile OS it was possible to make. It wasn't that they doubted Apple's commitment, they just didn't have the imagination. To be fair to them, Apple timed thi…

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,…

So the best company to get into the car space, if any were to try it:

* would have lots of spare capital * would have experience building/running plants * would know how to manage a long supply chain extremely well * carries huge cachet, allowing them to stand out in a competitive market. * Is not afraid to exclusively target the high-margin side of the market. * Knows a thing or two about entire sectors undergoing a revolution. * Has lots of experience building retail networks.

Well, what do you know, that sort of looks like Apple.

As for "not enough wow space" being available - that's what people thought about the phone industry as well.

Would I bet on Apple being a success? Probably not. But if anybody were to take on that market, Apple's one of the more well-placed contenders.

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