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If Apple decides to begin manufacturing cars, would their prior experience with manufacturing help or is the domain sufficiently different for there not to be a

If Apple decides to begin manufacturing cars, would their prior experience with manufacturing help or is the domain sufficiently different for there not to be any significant knowledge carryover? Are there any major or significant AI researchers working at Apple? It seems like I only ever hear about the big industry names moving between other big tech companies, but I'm not aware of anyone impactful in the AI space working at Apple. Maybe one of the key factors is that a lot of AI researchers like to publish their findings and Apple seems to be notoriously secretive? So even if Apple has a lot of top-tier researchers, maybe they're not publishing as much.

jaimex2 3y ago
They outsource manufacturing so they have no tech there. Given Apple was the Tesla reject bin I'm sure we will see a lot of interesting things come out of this. And yeah with AI, have a look at what companies they buy out. They won't be creating anything themselves. I'd be more interested to see if they make the mistake of relying on Lidar. Chances are they're just trying to make something they can sell to existing car manufacturers. Like CarPlay just at a larger scale.
- mymacbook 3y ago
  Can you cite your sources on the no tech there [manufacturing]? As someone who worked for Apple for nearly a decade on the engineering teams launching the iPhone and iPad, I beg to differ. While not the most "exciting" to those of us in Silicon Valley, Apple is a behemoth when it comes to factory. The engineering there is outstanding and even for those of us working higher up in the stack we didn't fully appreciate it until traveling oversees and intimately working within hw ops. A lot of Apple's new product process is now public, but when the hardware moves from EVT to DVT it is the first time both SW Dev and HW Ops are working together in the factory and while still "owned" by Dev, it will be up to HW Ops to scale, optimize, and propose any key changes that we would not have considered or planned for - dealing with low yields. Once DVT transitions to PVT, Dev is under Ops direction - it's their world and we are there to serve them! Before dismissing Apple's manufacturing design, engineering, and operations I would recommend learning a lot more if you are at all interested in this space or shipping your own products. Many companies in the valley building HW have adopted most of the principals Apple pioneered and refined in manufacturing...
conradev 3y ago
"Foxconn Makes Your iPhone. Now It Wants to Make Your Electric Car" https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2023-11-01/iphone-maker-foxconn-wants-to-build-electric-vehicles-next https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2023-11-01/iphone-ma... https://archive.ph/WdSFX https://archive.ph/WdSFX
FirmwareBurner 3y ago
You don't need to have any prior manufacturing experience to build cars if you don't want it. The car industry followed the semi industry with the fabless model, where not every brand needs to build a new factory for every model they sell but they often, especially for lower volume models like Fisker, subcontract manufacturing out to dedicated contract car manufacturers like Valmet[1] or Magna Steyr[2] who have their own fabs and experience and make cars for established big brands. They're kind of like the Foxconn of the car industry. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valmet_Automotive#Production https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valmet_Automotive#Production [2] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magna_Steyr#Produzierte_Fahrzeuge https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magna_Steyr#Produzierte_Fahrze...

jaimex2 3y ago

They outsource manufacturing so they have no tech there. Given Apple was the Tesla reject bin I'm sure we will see a lot of interesting things come out of this. And yeah with AI, have a look at what companies they buy out. They won't be creating anything themselves. I'd be more interested to see if they make the mistake of relying on Lidar. Chances are they're just trying to make something they can sell to existing car manufacturers. Like CarPlay just at a larger scale.

mymacbook 3y ago
Can you cite your sources on the no tech there [manufacturing]? As someone who worked for Apple for nearly a decade on the engineering teams launching the iPhone and iPad, I beg to differ. While not the most "exciting" to those of us in Silicon Valley, Apple is a behemoth when it comes to factory. The engineering there is outstanding and even for those of us working higher up in the stack we didn't fully appreciate it until traveling oversees and intimately working within hw ops. A lot of Apple's new product process is now public, but when the hardware moves from EVT to DVT it is the first time both SW Dev and HW Ops are working together in the factory and while still "owned" by Dev, it will be up to HW Ops to scale, optimize, and propose any key changes that we would not have considered or planned for - dealing with low yields. Once DVT transitions to PVT, Dev is under Ops direction - it's their world and we are there to serve them! Before dismissing Apple's manufacturing design, engineering, and operations I would recommend learning a lot more if you are at all interested in this space or shipping your own products. Many companies in the valley building HW have adopted most of the principals Apple pioneered and refined in manufacturing...

conradev 3y ago

"Foxconn Makes Your iPhone. Now It Wants to Make Your Electric Car" https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2023-11-01/iphone-maker-foxconn-wants-to-build-electric-vehicles-next https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2023-11-01/iphone-ma... https://archive.ph/WdSFX https://archive.ph/WdSFX

FirmwareBurner 3y ago

You don't need to have any prior manufacturing experience to build cars if you don't want it. The car industry followed the semi industry with the fabless model, where not every brand needs to build a new factory for every model they sell but they often, especially for lower volume models like Fisker, subcontract manufacturing out to dedicated contract car manufacturers like Valmet[1] or Magna Steyr[2] who have their own fabs and experience and make cars for established big brands. They're kind of like the Foxconn of the car industry. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valmet_Automotive#Production https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valmet_Automotive#Production [2] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magna_Steyr#Produzierte_Fahrzeuge https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magna_Steyr#Produzierte_Fahrze...