Even if Apple is working on a car, I can't imagine that it will cost any less than $50,000. I've always felt the amount of money people spend on luxury vehicles is obscene.
Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming
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Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming
#72All I want is an Ethernet port on my MacBook Pro. Please stop the maddening war on ports.
Edit: sorry I meant Macbook pro
Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming
#73According to this chart, Apple spent $6B in 2014 and is projected to spend just over $10B in 2016. For comparison, in 2014 Volkswagen spent $13.5B, Samsung spent $13.4B, and Microsoft spent $10.4B. [1] Apple has, historically, not been a big spender when it comes to research, tending to favor short-term, tightly focused research over long-term, curiosity driven research. Over the last few years their research budget…
Just imagine how much fun Ive would have designing an orbital space station. What's interesting is how aggressively they're moving into the car space if that's what's happening. The phone people had no idea, they got blindsided thinking Apple wouldn't have the guts, would never commit the money.
"Just imagine how much fun Ive would have designing an orbital space station."
Unpossible. Space stations need to be displayed against a black background (albeit one punctuated with twinkling dots of light). Ive doesn't do black background.
Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming
#74Earlier quoted context omitted.
Tesla makes 25% margin on their cars.
IIRC, Tesla has had only one profitable quarter since 2003, its founding. Last quarter, they had 1.4 Billion in cash and had a $280 Million shortfall. In ONE quarter. That's AFTER accounting for the +$350 Million-ish they brought in from the Model 3 pre-orders btw. I don't think they are going to repeat the +350ish thousand preorders at +$1000 cash per anytime soon.
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.
Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming
#75I really wonder how they will differentiate themselves from Tesla's offerings. Tesla represents the very cutting edge of innovation in the automotive industry being the leaders in autonomy, EVs, battery production, the chargin network, etc. I wonder if Apple will partner with Tesla to use their Gigafactory batteries and charging network. If not they would have a lot of ground to make up.
Tesla's made enormous strides in core automotive engineering but to answer your question you have to ask, what would make a 10X difference in a product category? That's Apple's rough criteria for entering a space. It's not just moving to electrics.
The answer, at least for Apple, has always been in user-facing software. The hardware is a "pretty box" (to use Jobs' phrase) and certainly there is impressive core engineering there. But the 10X difference comes from fundamentally re-envisioned software platforms and user interfaces.
So this doesn't make much sense for cars if we only think in terms of traditional automotive engineering or "merely" shifting to an electric platform. Tons of incredible feats of engineering, but not a 10X difference in user experience or opening of a new landscape like the Mac, iPhone, etc.
BUT if we look to the (semi-)autonomous future then it's a huge wide-open landscape of innovation. And it's all about the software smarts and user interface. It's critical to understand that the user interface is essential, i.e. that we will not simply jump to fully autonomous cars. They will be cars that interface with human drivers for quite some time. So that's where Apple will compete with Tesla.
And yes getting the underlying (electric) automotive hardware and production right is a huge challenge in and of itself, but ultimately technically feasible. The software layer on top of it is more of a proprietary differentiator in the long run.
Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming
#76It'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…
First, Apple's historic design advantage is probably gone - since the competition has greatly improved. For example, the watch didn't offer something significantly different(10x) than other smartwatches.
But i can see your second point being true, maybe full-autonomy will take a long time. So even if Apple will design a great interface, it would probably be copied by competitors fast enough, unless there's some big barrier to copying that interface like the phone had in apps. What could that barrier possibly be ?
The only exception i can think of:
The addition of radio for most cars was an important invention.
So let's go wild - what if Apple succeeds in making siri a true AI, with a great personality, someone you'd have great fun driving with, everyday to work ?
Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming
#77All I want is an Ethernet port on my MacBook Pro. Please stop the maddening war on ports. Edit: sorry I meant Macbook pro
It does. It has two of them in fact.
Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming
#78It'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…
I know people have said this before and been very wrong for it, but I just don't think there's much in those constraints to innovate (read Blackberry). Unless you change the only fundamental aspects of owning a car (driving, parking, and maintenance), all you're doing is polishing a turd. If Apple is just building the car, and fully autonomous transport is out of the picture, then all they can hope to do is make it e…
You mentioned Blackberry. Pre-iPhone, the world probably would have said there isn't much you can do to innovate on smartphones. They will always need keyboards so the screen has to be small, etc.
With cars I want to underscore what I said about a "10X" improvement in safety and convenience. That is not just polishing a turd. What does it take to actually get to a car that largely drives itself, on myriad roads and conditions? It is wishful thinking to believe cars will do this all by themselves without drivers anytime soon.
Instead, think of a UI that is much more about "mind-melding" with a human driver. Letting them know exactly what it is planning to do, how it intends on navigating that stretch of Highway 1 without driving off the cliff. THAT will probably require fundamentally rethinking the cockpit. You will be mostly focused on "driving by instruments".
If they can achieve that, then we get cars that really do save thousands of lives and make the journey much more relaxing.
Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming
#79All I want is an Ethernet port on my MacBook Pro. Please stop the maddening war on ports. Edit: sorry I meant Macbook pro
It does. It has two of them in fact.
...via dongle, at US$29 each, thank you very much. Want to connect an external screen at the same time? Too bad.
I'll take built in ethernet and two display connectors on my lenovo instead. Want to add another network port? Well, there's USB3 gigabit, or simply USB-C. If you need native PCIe adaptors, then Dell XPS range comes with Thunderbolt 3 via USB-C.
Sorry, I have to agree with the parent that the port war is growing tiring. Unless there's a plethora of USB-C ports on the laptop we still need our connectors.
Re: Apple R&D Reveals a Pivot Is Coming
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
Tesla makes 25% margin on their cars.
But still loses money
There is a big difference between loosing money because you build and sell individual cars at a loss, and investing in further capacity. They make money on the cars they build and sell, the overall loss comes from investing in the new factories and product lines. This should come as no surprise to anyone familiar with startups.