7 ms·

What I feel like everyone is missing is that an Apple Car makes sense for the same reason the iPhone made sense in 2007: The existing technology really blows,

by nardi 10y ago

What I feel like everyone is missing is that an Apple Car makes sense for the same reason the iPhone made sense in 2007: The existing technology really blows, and Apple can make a significant contribution. Remember what "smartphones" looked like before the iPhone? No touch screens, physical keyboards, tiny screens, almost no native web browsing. Now imagine what Apple could do to the inside of your car with that kind of thinking in mind, and $80,000. Edit: I forgot one of the biggest problems with the old smartphones is they were ugly as sin, which is also true of modern cars.

wavefunction 10y ago
>The existing technology really blows, and Apple can make a significant contribution. This is absolutely ridiculous. Apple is starting out at 0 with no real competence in this area, the least of which is interaction with regulatory bodies tasked with consumer protection.
- jameshart 10y ago
  All of which is also true when Apple set out to make a phone. They had no competence in RF engineering, or interaction with the diversity of cellphone network providers throughout the world, the conventional wisdom at the time was that an outsider couldn't just break in to the phone market without acquiring an existing manufacturer.
  - maroonblazer 10y ago
    The difference is that cell phones can't inadvertently kill people to the degree automobiles can.
  - kevin_thibedeau 10y ago
    There's a huge difference between iterating an iPod into a phone and moving from consumer electronics to a completely different market that just happens to depend on some electronics but requires a whole lot more engineering know-how that Apple has in its stables.
  - billiam 10y ago
    Sorry, I call BS on this. I know a good bit about the semi-secret history here. I worked at Motorola before and during the launch of the first iPhone and also knew some of the people on the original iPhone product team. While it is true that they started with very few mobile industry veterans, they hired a few key people; they either quickly learned how to maneuver inside Apple or disappeared without a trace. So it is not accurate to say Apple just learned how to make smartphones really fast, more that they effectively hacked the whole process with a number of Jedi mind tricks as well as key product decisions, all cemented by classic Steve Jobs dickery. 1. They cultivated us at Motorola shamelessly by pretending to make an "iTunes phone" (remember the Rockr?) while they were just pumping our teams for information on how the byzantine portfolio and terminal acceptance process at carriers worked. They never intended that phone to ship and used the whole sordid con to get into Ralph de le Vega's office (sorry, Ed Zander). They then used all the persuasion and BS they had to convince AT&T to give Apple a pass on the incredibly complex field network testing all phones must pass. The reason the overall phone experience of the first iPhone was so bad was not just because Jobs and co wanted it to be a great music and Internet experience first, but because they couldn't make a great phone at all then. I don't see the exact analogy with teh car industry. cars. The mobile phone business was laughably over-regulated and unlike the extremely competitive phone industry, wireless carriers were not really. And oh yeah, smartphones were terrible, and cars today, whether you like the way they look or not, are some of the most incredibly optimized products ever made by man: safe, reliable, efficient. Cars just can't be disrupted via a Jesus phone coming in at the high end with innovative features. The Jesus car already exists (Tesla) and it has been extremely successful at influencing one of the biggest industries in the world in numerous ways. But if your goal, like Apple, is to not just influence but manufacture at scale, then Tesla has failed and it appears it will take any company, even Apple, decades to learn how to really make cars for more than a few. I sure hope this isn't just abut cars as a service, because Apple has demonstrated it just can't do services, even when latched to a truly beautiful shiny object it has made.
    - smcnally 10y ago
      > because Apple has demonstrated it just can't do services "In Fiscal 2015, the Services bin, “revenue from the iTunes Store ® , App Store, Mac App Store, iBooks StoreTM and Apple MusicTM (collectively “Internet Services”), AppleCare, Apple Pay ® , licensing and other services” counted for $19.9B, 8.5% of the company total." http://archive.mondaynote.com/2016/01/25/watching-apples-first-fiscal-2016-quarter/ http://archive.mondaynote.com/2016/01/25/watching-apples-fir...
- rpgmaker 10y ago
  It is also bullshit. Existing technology doesn't "blow" either.
  - phatfish 10y ago
    Yup, there seems to be worrying trend on HN that any company not a part of the tech inner circle has no idea what the are doing. Funny because more than once there have been articles here about how assuming unusual/ugly code is the work of an incompetent engineer is short sighted, as often professionals DO know what they are doing, and it was done for a good reason that is not immediately apparent.
- kalleboo 10y ago
  > Apple is starting out at 0 with no real competence in this area, the least of which is interaction with regulatory bodies tasked with consumer protection Couldn't that competence be hired in? Tesla also started from zero.
  - aphextron 10y ago
    >Tesla also started from zero. Yes they did, 15 years ago. Even with their deep pockets, Apple has a long way to go from zero to production.
- ddebernardy 10y ago
  Your assessment, whether correct or not (I've no idea), has an oddly familiar ring: > “We’ve learned and struggled for a few years here figuring out how to make a decent phone. PC guys are not going to just figure this out. They’re not going to just walk in.” -- November 16, 2006, Palm CEO, Ed Colligan > “Apple is slated to come out with a new phone… And it will largely fail…. Sales for the phone will skyrocket initially. However, things will calm down, and the Apple phone will take its place on the shelves with the random video cameras, cell phones, wireless routers and other would-be hits… When the iPod emerged in late 2001, it solved some major problems with MP3 players. Unfortunately for Apple, problems like that don’t exist in the handset business. Cell phones aren’t clunky, inadequate devices. Instead, they are pretty good. Really good.” -- December 07, 2006, CNET, Michael Kanellos http://www.loopinsight.com/2012/06/29/iphone-turns-5-here-are-the-naysayers/ http://www.loopinsight.com/2012/06/29/iphone-turns-5-here-ar...
  - sangnoir 10y ago
    > Your assessment, whether correct or not (I've no idea), has an oddly familiar ring I'm going to go ahead and claim your argument adds little value due to overgeneralization. Just because some guys were wrong in their criticism of Apple doesn't mean everyone who criticizes Apple is wrong. If I weren't feeling lazy, I would produce a long list of quotations that wrongly claimed the iPad would deprecate desktop computing (from both inside Apple and outside). The term "post-PC era" was being bandied about. So no, Apple doesn't always achieve their goals - even stated ones.
    - matt4077 10y ago
      The analogy was fitting because it was basically the same argument: "they're not (phone|car) people...". It doesn't mean that it's a certain success, but it does show that Apple can innovate in new areas and complacency is possibly not the best idea for the current market leaders.
      - zajd 10y ago
        Building a car is a little different than a phone, from pretty much any perspective.
- tlrobinson 10y ago
  No, Tesla started at 0. Apple is starting at 0, plus many billions of dollars of cash in the bank.
ChuckMcM 10y ago
I just hope they don't claim to have invented the car. Seriously. I am all for interesting design ideas making it to market based on less risk averse capital but I get tired of the hype. Probably a sign of senescence. I would much rather see a re-imagining of bus lines with 2 or 4 person pods that you can summon from a stop, and ride directly to your next stop. Such a personal transit system was envisioned in the early 80's but lacked the cost effectiveness of the computer controls we have today. Such a system, on a closed pavement track system, would be buildable today with little to no technical risk.
- redorb 10y ago
  But they did reinvent the phone. If they deliver the first end to end point car - I believe they can claim to have reinvented the car. That's a big if though. I think they'll launch something really cool and that they come close to being the first autonomous car the general population accepts - most likely with BMW or Mercedes. Coming to ford / gm a few years later
  - wavefunction 10y ago
    Ford is probably ahead or at least in parity with BMW/Mercedes. That you lump Ford in with GM is a huge red flag to the rest of your contentions.
    - Godel_unicode 10y ago
      You left out the company which I think is the obvious Apple contender; Porsche, which is the gold standard for premium cars and SUVs. Porsche is the reason that Tesla is in trouble, they are the best example of having an exciting car that is instantly recognizable and extremely high quality, yet superbly engineered and (this is the Tesla-killing part) just as nice inside as outside or under the hood. If Apple were to make a gasoline powered car, they'd make the 911 turbo. It even comes in white :) https://goo.gl/images/LF95vo https://goo.gl/images/LF95vo
      - sjwright 10y ago
georgeecollins 10y ago
You are driving the wrong car.
georgeecollins 10y ago
You are driving the wrong car.
delinka 10y ago
Palm Treo had a touchscreen. OK, I mean pokescreen. And yes, it was terrible.
iambateman 10y ago
The big question to me is whether they can make a "car" that looks little like the car we think of right now and still have it accepted by the market. Not necessarily on the exterior, but an entertainment-geared interior that is comfortable and also legal/safe. And also whether they can push out an industry-shaking product without Steve. Tim Cook is amazing, don't get me wrong, but he doesn't seem like the radical we need. Edit: the radical we need for car reinvention specifically.
- Aloha 10y ago
  I actually think Tim Cook's more methodical way of solving problems will succeed far better with cars, than Jobs method of radical leaps.
dave1619 10y ago
With smartphones, Apple had Blackberry as their competition. But with cars, Apple has Tesla. Completely different.
- ams6110 10y ago
  And Ford. And GM. And Volvo. And Mercedes-Benz. And Audi. And Porsche. And BMW. And others.
  - apapli 10y ago
    Just like Ericsson and Nokia? They didn't stand a chance, as history has proven. Especially given most of these car companies don't have a huge pile of cash on the sidelines.
    - sangnoir 10y ago
      Social-signalling/being a 'high-end' phone is what the iPhone's success rode on, and there were no high-end smartphones (well, there was Virtu but they were more botique than mass-produced high-end). There already exist a smorgasbord of luxury cars that are social signallers; Apple will have to do something much more 'revolutionary' than they did with the iPhone. There weren't any smartphone equivalents of Mercedes-Benz, Porsche[1] or Maserati. 1. If you're thinking "all of those are petrol guzzlers", you're wrong - Porsche is working on an electric car: http://www.porsche.com/microsite/mission-e/international.aspx http://www.porsche.com/microsite/mission-e/international.asp...
      - Infinitesimus 10y ago
        But Apple is still perceived as a premium brand by many. I am unsure of how many of those belong to the class of people who will buy a premium car but am willing to bet there are just enough to be dangerous. Apple is also more well-known than Tesla currently. I still think it won't be easy for Apple but I've learned to appreciate the power of market perception.
kartickv 10y ago
I concur with rpgmaker that it's bullshit to say that the existing technology "blows". Tell me exactly how an Apple car will be better than my existing petrol-powered car. Not in an abstract sense, for me. With the iPhone, we had the full web (as opposed to only the mobile web), a large screen, a touch interface, only one button, and (in 2.0) apps. These made the iPhone far better than older phones. What's the equivalent for cars?
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- nardi 10y ago
  Everyone really liked their crappy Palm Treos in 2007 too. No one but Apple saw the future of smartphones.
  - kartickv 10y ago
    I agree with that, but you haven't given any information or insight to substantiate your claim that the Apple car will be the next iPhone. Merely saying "it will be awesome!" doesn't convince anyone :)
    - nardi 10y ago
      I can only point to the fact that cars and transportation in general are obviously about to be heavily disrupted by software--in many ways. Just like phones and communications in 2006.
- ryanmarsh 10y ago
  > Tell me exactly how an Apple car will be better than my existing petrol-powered car. Not in an abstract sense, for me. Nope. Can't explain it in a way you'll feel it. Doesn't mean it's not a thing though. I thought the Tesla Model S was an understated 4 door sedan with a novel but fatally flawed propulsion technology. Then I spent a day in one. It was enough to convince me to plop down the deposit for a Model 3 sight unseen. And there's still nothing wrong with my Toyota 4 Runner. But if Tesla makes a light SUV I'm buying it. It's just ... better.
kyriakos 10y ago
The car industry is much more mature than the smartphone industry when iPhone was introduced. It will be much harder to convince anyone to buy your car over the trusted brands or tesla
- nardi 10y ago
  Like software was about to eat communication in 2006, software is about to eat transportation now.
  - kyriakos 10y ago
    the difference is that back then you could buy off-the-shelf components and have your phone built in china (what apple did and does). you can't easily do the same with a car. yes apple can create good software for a car but they might be better off licensing it to car manufacturers than providing an end to end solution.
    - matt4077 10y ago
      You can easily outsource car manufacturing as well. You're also underestimating the amount of hardware design Apple did and does. They don't buy the display, cpu, touchscreen, battery or much else off the shelf.
- danpalmer 10y ago
  The electric car industry however, is not. They share a fair amount, but there are also a lot of significant differences that have only really been explored at scale by a few companies for a few years.
jmknoll 10y ago
Its been said elsewhere, but making cars is hard. Large multinational companies with decades of relevant expertise struggle to make cars. Not just with the technical issues, but with regulatory issues as well, which for many engineering-driven companies end up being almost as significant obstacles as the tech itself. Tesla is doing very well, but is still facing hurdles, and tough competition. And Tesla is dedicated 100% to making cars, with a founder who was willing to bet (and potentially lose) everything on his push for electric cars. I'm just not convinced that a $500 billion, 100,000-person company can pivot into being a car company, nor am I convinced that a company whose specialty is the development of phones, computers, and software can open up a car arm and successfully go toe-to-toe against Mercedes, BWM, and (to a lesser extent) Tesla.
- nardi 10y ago
  From 2006: Responding to questions from New York Times correspondent John Markoff at a Churchill Club breakfast gathering Thursday morning, Colligan laughed off the idea that any company — including the wildly popular Apple Computer — could easily win customers in the finicky smart-phone sector. “We’ve learned and struggled for a few years here figuring out how to make a decent phone,” he said. “PC guys are not going to just figure this out. They’re not going to just walk in.”
  - zajd 10y ago
    Is there anything Apple could announce they are making where you wouldn't post this quote? Private prisons? Spaceships? Artifical asteroid colonies?
shenberg 10y ago
Phones used to do one thing really well: phone calls. The iphone was the first smartphone where other uses like web browsing were plausible, and now phones are barely used for calls at all. Cars do one thing really well: driving. What, exactly, is the new form of use of cars that an Apple car can open up? What are you going to use your car for that isn't getting from point A to point B?
- sangnoir 10y ago
  > Cars do one thing really well: driving. What, exactly, is the new form of use of cars that an Apple car can open up? Level 4 or 5 autonomous driving would be nice little coup. Unfortunately for Apple, the technology isn't quite there yet as it was on the brink of the iPhone launch.
brandon272 10y ago
There is so much that Apple could do to truly "reimagine" the car. They have the capital and the capability to build the product. But when I think of what a "reimagined" car looks like, I envision a product that would need extensive study by regulatory bodies before it would be allowed on the road due to it's highly automated nature. And I wonder if that is something that Apple is interested in challenging, not only in states and federally, but with governments all around the world.

by nardi 10y ago

wavefunction 10y ago

>The existing technology really blows, and Apple can make a significant contribution. This is absolutely ridiculous. Apple is starting out at 0 with no real competence in this area, the least of which is interaction with regulatory bodies tasked with consumer protection.

jameshart 10y ago
All of which is also true when Apple set out to make a phone. They had no competence in RF engineering, or interaction with the diversity of cellphone network providers throughout the world, the conventional wisdom at the time was that an outsider couldn't just break in to the phone market without acquiring an existing manufacturer.
- maroonblazer 10y ago
  The difference is that cell phones can't inadvertently kill people to the degree automobiles can.
- kevin_thibedeau 10y ago
  There's a huge difference between iterating an iPod into a phone and moving from consumer electronics to a completely different market that just happens to depend on some electronics but requires a whole lot more engineering know-how that Apple has in its stables.
- billiam 10y ago
  Sorry, I call BS on this. I know a good bit about the semi-secret history here. I worked at Motorola before and during the launch of the first iPhone and also knew some of the people on the original iPhone product team. While it is true that they started with very few mobile industry veterans, they hired a few key people; they either quickly learned how to maneuver inside Apple or disappeared without a trace. So it is not accurate to say Apple just learned how to make smartphones really fast, more that they effectively hacked the whole process with a number of Jedi mind tricks as well as key product decisions, all cemented by classic Steve Jobs dickery. 1. They cultivated us at Motorola shamelessly by pretending to make an "iTunes phone" (remember the Rockr?) while they were just pumping our teams for information on how the byzantine portfolio and terminal acceptance process at carriers worked. They never intended that phone to ship and used the whole sordid con to get into Ralph de le Vega's office (sorry, Ed Zander). They then used all the persuasion and BS they had to convince AT&T to give Apple a pass on the incredibly complex field network testing all phones must pass. The reason the overall phone experience of the first iPhone was so bad was not just because Jobs and co wanted it to be a great music and Internet experience first, but because they couldn't make a great phone at all then. I don't see the exact analogy with teh car industry. cars. The mobile phone business was laughably over-regulated and unlike the extremely competitive phone industry, wireless carriers were not really. And oh yeah, smartphones were terrible, and cars today, whether you like the way they look or not, are some of the most incredibly optimized products ever made by man: safe, reliable, efficient. Cars just can't be disrupted via a Jesus phone coming in at the high end with innovative features. The Jesus car already exists (Tesla) and it has been extremely successful at influencing one of the biggest industries in the world in numerous ways. But if your goal, like Apple, is to not just influence but manufacture at scale, then Tesla has failed and it appears it will take any company, even Apple, decades to learn how to really make cars for more than a few. I sure hope this isn't just abut cars as a service, because Apple has demonstrated it just can't do services, even when latched to a truly beautiful shiny object it has made.
  - smcnally 10y ago
    > because Apple has demonstrated it just can't do services "In Fiscal 2015, the Services bin, “revenue from the iTunes Store ® , App Store, Mac App Store, iBooks StoreTM and Apple MusicTM (collectively “Internet Services”), AppleCare, Apple Pay ® , licensing and other services” counted for $19.9B, 8.5% of the company total." http://archive.mondaynote.com/2016/01/25/watching-apples-first-fiscal-2016-quarter/ http://archive.mondaynote.com/2016/01/25/watching-apples-fir...
rpgmaker 10y ago
It is also bullshit. Existing technology doesn't "blow" either.
- phatfish 10y ago
  Yup, there seems to be worrying trend on HN that any company not a part of the tech inner circle has no idea what the are doing. Funny because more than once there have been articles here about how assuming unusual/ugly code is the work of an incompetent engineer is short sighted, as often professionals DO know what they are doing, and it was done for a good reason that is not immediately apparent.
kalleboo 10y ago
> Apple is starting out at 0 with no real competence in this area, the least of which is interaction with regulatory bodies tasked with consumer protection Couldn't that competence be hired in? Tesla also started from zero.
- aphextron 10y ago
  >Tesla also started from zero. Yes they did, 15 years ago. Even with their deep pockets, Apple has a long way to go from zero to production.
ddebernardy 10y ago
Your assessment, whether correct or not (I've no idea), has an oddly familiar ring: > “We’ve learned and struggled for a few years here figuring out how to make a decent phone. PC guys are not going to just figure this out. They’re not going to just walk in.” -- November 16, 2006, Palm CEO, Ed Colligan > “Apple is slated to come out with a new phone… And it will largely fail…. Sales for the phone will skyrocket initially. However, things will calm down, and the Apple phone will take its place on the shelves with the random video cameras, cell phones, wireless routers and other would-be hits… When the iPod emerged in late 2001, it solved some major problems with MP3 players. Unfortunately for Apple, problems like that don’t exist in the handset business. Cell phones aren’t clunky, inadequate devices. Instead, they are pretty good. Really good.” -- December 07, 2006, CNET, Michael Kanellos http://www.loopinsight.com/2012/06/29/iphone-turns-5-here-are-the-naysayers/ http://www.loopinsight.com/2012/06/29/iphone-turns-5-here-ar...
- sangnoir 10y ago
  > Your assessment, whether correct or not (I've no idea), has an oddly familiar ring I'm going to go ahead and claim your argument adds little value due to overgeneralization. Just because some guys were wrong in their criticism of Apple doesn't mean everyone who criticizes Apple is wrong. If I weren't feeling lazy, I would produce a long list of quotations that wrongly claimed the iPad would deprecate desktop computing (from both inside Apple and outside). The term "post-PC era" was being bandied about. So no, Apple doesn't always achieve their goals - even stated ones.
  - matt4077 10y ago
    The analogy was fitting because it was basically the same argument: "they're not (phone|car) people...". It doesn't mean that it's a certain success, but it does show that Apple can innovate in new areas and complacency is possibly not the best idea for the current market leaders.
    - zajd 10y ago
      Building a car is a little different than a phone, from pretty much any perspective.
tlrobinson 10y ago
No, Tesla started at 0. Apple is starting at 0, plus many billions of dollars of cash in the bank.

ChuckMcM 10y ago

I just hope they don't claim to have invented the car. Seriously. I am all for interesting design ideas making it to market based on less risk averse capital but I get tired of the hype. Probably a sign of senescence. I would much rather see a re-imagining of bus lines with 2 or 4 person pods that you can summon from a stop, and ride directly to your next stop. Such a personal transit system was envisioned in the early 80's but lacked the cost effectiveness of the computer controls we have today. Such a system, on a closed pavement track system, would be buildable today with little to no technical risk.

redorb 10y ago
But they did reinvent the phone. If they deliver the first end to end point car - I believe they can claim to have reinvented the car. That's a big if though. I think they'll launch something really cool and that they come close to being the first autonomous car the general population accepts - most likely with BMW or Mercedes. Coming to ford / gm a few years later
- wavefunction 10y ago
  Ford is probably ahead or at least in parity with BMW/Mercedes. That you lump Ford in with GM is a huge red flag to the rest of your contentions.
  - Godel_unicode 10y ago
    You left out the company which I think is the obvious Apple contender; Porsche, which is the gold standard for premium cars and SUVs. Porsche is the reason that Tesla is in trouble, they are the best example of having an exciting car that is instantly recognizable and extremely high quality, yet superbly engineered and (this is the Tesla-killing part) just as nice inside as outside or under the hood. If Apple were to make a gasoline powered car, they'd make the 911 turbo. It even comes in white :) https://goo.gl/images/LF95vo https://goo.gl/images/LF95vo
    - sjwright 10y ago

georgeecollins 10y ago

You are driving the wrong car.

georgeecollins 10y ago

You are driving the wrong car.

delinka 10y ago

Palm Treo had a touchscreen. OK, I mean pokescreen. And yes, it was terrible.

iambateman 10y ago

The big question to me is whether they can make a "car" that looks little like the car we think of right now and still have it accepted by the market. Not necessarily on the exterior, but an entertainment-geared interior that is comfortable and also legal/safe. And also whether they can push out an industry-shaking product without Steve. Tim Cook is amazing, don't get me wrong, but he doesn't seem like the radical we need. Edit: the radical we need for car reinvention specifically.

Aloha 10y ago
I actually think Tim Cook's more methodical way of solving problems will succeed far better with cars, than Jobs method of radical leaps.

dave1619 10y ago

With smartphones, Apple had Blackberry as their competition. But with cars, Apple has Tesla. Completely different.

ams6110 10y ago
And Ford. And GM. And Volvo. And Mercedes-Benz. And Audi. And Porsche. And BMW. And others.
- apapli 10y ago
  Just like Ericsson and Nokia? They didn't stand a chance, as history has proven. Especially given most of these car companies don't have a huge pile of cash on the sidelines.
  - sangnoir 10y ago
    Social-signalling/being a 'high-end' phone is what the iPhone's success rode on, and there were no high-end smartphones (well, there was Virtu but they were more botique than mass-produced high-end). There already exist a smorgasbord of luxury cars that are social signallers; Apple will have to do something much more 'revolutionary' than they did with the iPhone. There weren't any smartphone equivalents of Mercedes-Benz, Porsche[1] or Maserati. 1. If you're thinking "all of those are petrol guzzlers", you're wrong - Porsche is working on an electric car: http://www.porsche.com/microsite/mission-e/international.aspx http://www.porsche.com/microsite/mission-e/international.asp...
    - Infinitesimus 10y ago
      But Apple is still perceived as a premium brand by many. I am unsure of how many of those belong to the class of people who will buy a premium car but am willing to bet there are just enough to be dangerous. Apple is also more well-known than Tesla currently. I still think it won't be easy for Apple but I've learned to appreciate the power of market perception.

kartickv 10y ago

I concur with rpgmaker that it's bullshit to say that the existing technology "blows". Tell me exactly how an Apple car will be better than my existing petrol-powered car. Not in an abstract sense, for me. With the iPhone, we had the full web (as opposed to only the mobile web), a large screen, a touch interface, only one button, and (in 2.0) apps. These made the iPhone far better than older phones. What's the equivalent for cars?

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
nardi 10y ago
Everyone really liked their crappy Palm Treos in 2007 too. No one but Apple saw the future of smartphones.
- kartickv 10y ago
  I agree with that, but you haven't given any information or insight to substantiate your claim that the Apple car will be the next iPhone. Merely saying "it will be awesome!" doesn't convince anyone :)
  - nardi 10y ago
    I can only point to the fact that cars and transportation in general are obviously about to be heavily disrupted by software--in many ways. Just like phones and communications in 2006.
ryanmarsh 10y ago
> Tell me exactly how an Apple car will be better than my existing petrol-powered car. Not in an abstract sense, for me. Nope. Can't explain it in a way you'll feel it. Doesn't mean it's not a thing though. I thought the Tesla Model S was an understated 4 door sedan with a novel but fatally flawed propulsion technology. Then I spent a day in one. It was enough to convince me to plop down the deposit for a Model 3 sight unseen. And there's still nothing wrong with my Toyota 4 Runner. But if Tesla makes a light SUV I'm buying it. It's just ... better.

kyriakos 10y ago

The car industry is much more mature than the smartphone industry when iPhone was introduced. It will be much harder to convince anyone to buy your car over the trusted brands or tesla

nardi 10y ago
Like software was about to eat communication in 2006, software is about to eat transportation now.
- kyriakos 10y ago
  the difference is that back then you could buy off-the-shelf components and have your phone built in china (what apple did and does). you can't easily do the same with a car. yes apple can create good software for a car but they might be better off licensing it to car manufacturers than providing an end to end solution.
  - matt4077 10y ago
    You can easily outsource car manufacturing as well. You're also underestimating the amount of hardware design Apple did and does. They don't buy the display, cpu, touchscreen, battery or much else off the shelf.
danpalmer 10y ago
The electric car industry however, is not. They share a fair amount, but there are also a lot of significant differences that have only really been explored at scale by a few companies for a few years.

jmknoll 10y ago

Its been said elsewhere, but making cars is hard. Large multinational companies with decades of relevant expertise struggle to make cars. Not just with the technical issues, but with regulatory issues as well, which for many engineering-driven companies end up being almost as significant obstacles as the tech itself. Tesla is doing very well, but is still facing hurdles, and tough competition. And Tesla is dedicated 100% to making cars, with a founder who was willing to bet (and potentially lose) everything on his push for electric cars. I'm just not convinced that a $500 billion, 100,000-person company can pivot into being a car company, nor am I convinced that a company whose specialty is the development of phones, computers, and software can open up a car arm and successfully go toe-to-toe against Mercedes, BWM, and (to a lesser extent) Tesla.

nardi 10y ago
From 2006: Responding to questions from New York Times correspondent John Markoff at a Churchill Club breakfast gathering Thursday morning, Colligan laughed off the idea that any company — including the wildly popular Apple Computer — could easily win customers in the finicky smart-phone sector. “We’ve learned and struggled for a few years here figuring out how to make a decent phone,” he said. “PC guys are not going to just figure this out. They’re not going to just walk in.”
- zajd 10y ago
  Is there anything Apple could announce they are making where you wouldn't post this quote? Private prisons? Spaceships? Artifical asteroid colonies?

shenberg 10y ago

Phones used to do one thing really well: phone calls. The iphone was the first smartphone where other uses like web browsing were plausible, and now phones are barely used for calls at all. Cars do one thing really well: driving. What, exactly, is the new form of use of cars that an Apple car can open up? What are you going to use your car for that isn't getting from point A to point B?

sangnoir 10y ago
> Cars do one thing really well: driving. What, exactly, is the new form of use of cars that an Apple car can open up? Level 4 or 5 autonomous driving would be nice little coup. Unfortunately for Apple, the technology isn't quite there yet as it was on the brink of the iPhone launch.

brandon272 10y ago

There is so much that Apple could do to truly "reimagine" the car. They have the capital and the capability to build the product. But when I think of what a "reimagined" car looks like, I envision a product that would need extensive study by regulatory bodies before it would be allowed on the road due to it's highly automated nature. And I wonder if that is something that Apple is interested in challenging, not only in states and federally, but with governments all around the world.