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It’s all fun and games until Apple wants 30% of your revenue. I feel Apple has seriously harmed the trust of potential partners too much for them to bet the far

It’s all fun and games until Apple wants 30% of your revenue. I feel Apple has seriously harmed the trust of potential partners too much for them to bet the farm on deep integration.

madeofpalk 3y ago
Right - the problem is car companies ceeding that 30% to Apple, when they could be rent-seeking instead.
- tapoxi 3y ago
  Isn't it rent seeking in both cases?
- sircastor 3y ago
  I worked for a car company in Infotainment for several years, and while I wasn't privy to any conversations like this, I can say that they (my company at least) are desperately brainstorming ways to come up with anything to make money. This is why we've seen all those crazy ideas like BMW trying to make seat warmers a subscription. They're trying to find some way to maintain a better cash inflow than selling a product.
  - tpurves 3y ago
    I also spent time working with car makers while at Visa. There was a LOT of wishful thinking by carmakers that they could magic-up their own digital app stores (and pay for gas, for parking for drive-thru) all through their own proprietary infotainment platforms. There were these hopelessly unscaleable expectations that brands (McDonalds, Chevron etc.) would want to build and maintain custom apps just for, say, this model year's new 3-series BMW, and then do the same for every other car maker and model type. It was very much like the shortlived mindset of carriers trying to control downloadable mobile apps, prior to the iphone/appstore.
- tpurves 3y ago
  Rent-seeking by apple and rent-seeking by car makers are both legitimate concerns! I guess the sentiment for the rest of us punters and hoopleheads is, if we have to be rent-sook by one of them, at least CarPlay is likely to have a less-unpleasant user experience?
  - matthewdgreen 3y ago
    If there are ten rent-seeking car manufacturers, you can conceivably buy your next car from a different company. If there are 1-2 phone OS makers (both coincidentally charging identical fees and duplicating the same business model) you’ve got many fewer options.
konschubert 3y ago
If I were a car company I would try to focus on making good cars. I'd leave the software to others, making sure to support both CarPlay and Android Auto.
- ako 3y ago
  There's a lot of software in a car besides the entertainment system, you can't leave that to carplay or android. To make good cars, car companies need to be able to write good software.
  - vagrantJin 3y ago
    nope nopr nope. Car manufacturers should engineer good cars. Leave the good software engineering to good software engineering firms.
    - spockz 3y ago
      That is what GP is saying. There are two types of software in the car. The entertainment system and the software that drives the engines (ECU), lights, etc, etc. The car company should be good at software engineering to ensure that all software directly related with driving is done properly. And then leave the faster paced entertainment software to other suppliers.
      - ako 3y ago
        Auto pilot, adaptive cruise control, engine start stop controller, brakes, gas, etc, etc. Modern cars can’t drive without software. 100m+ lines of code in a car, 70-100 cpus according to this article: https://medium.com/next-level-german-engineering/porsche-future-of-code-526eb3de3bbe https://medium.com/next-level-german-engineering/porsche-fut...
        spockz 3y ago
        Exactly! That is the software I want the car engineers to focus on. I do expect most have their firmware provided by Bosch/Siemens or whichever supplier. But Tesla shows how much improvement there is to gain when designing cars from the ground up instead of from parts lists of a vendor.
netsharc 3y ago
Don't they (Apple) want a monthly fee from each install, causing the car manufacturers having to pass the cost on to their customers?
- rekoil 3y ago
  No, Apple doesn't charge for the existence of CarPlay in a particular car. The manufacturers used to for a while, probably to reclaim their perceived implementation costs and because the industry has worked that way for a long time, but that's not as common anymore, most (besides certain manufacturers) ship it as a default now.
firloop 3y ago
Depending on the specifics, 30% for a deep Apple partnership sounds like an amazing deal
oldpersonintx 3y ago
[dead]
dzhiurgis 3y ago
Almost certain when EV charging apps get embedded in carplay. On a flip side - having one app instead of 10 would be nice…

It’s all fun and games until Apple wants 30% of your revenue. I feel Apple has seriously harmed the trust of potential partners too much for them to bet the farm on deep integration.

madeofpalk 3y ago

Right - the problem is car companies ceeding that 30% to Apple, when they could be rent-seeking instead.

tapoxi 3y ago
Isn't it rent seeking in both cases?
sircastor 3y ago
I worked for a car company in Infotainment for several years, and while I wasn't privy to any conversations like this, I can say that they (my company at least) are desperately brainstorming ways to come up with anything to make money. This is why we've seen all those crazy ideas like BMW trying to make seat warmers a subscription. They're trying to find some way to maintain a better cash inflow than selling a product.
- tpurves 3y ago
  I also spent time working with car makers while at Visa. There was a LOT of wishful thinking by carmakers that they could magic-up their own digital app stores (and pay for gas, for parking for drive-thru) all through their own proprietary infotainment platforms. There were these hopelessly unscaleable expectations that brands (McDonalds, Chevron etc.) would want to build and maintain custom apps just for, say, this model year's new 3-series BMW, and then do the same for every other car maker and model type. It was very much like the shortlived mindset of carriers trying to control downloadable mobile apps, prior to the iphone/appstore.
tpurves 3y ago
Rent-seeking by apple and rent-seeking by car makers are both legitimate concerns! I guess the sentiment for the rest of us punters and hoopleheads is, if we have to be rent-sook by one of them, at least CarPlay is likely to have a less-unpleasant user experience?
- matthewdgreen 3y ago
  If there are ten rent-seeking car manufacturers, you can conceivably buy your next car from a different company. If there are 1-2 phone OS makers (both coincidentally charging identical fees and duplicating the same business model) you’ve got many fewer options.

konschubert 3y ago

If I were a car company I would try to focus on making good cars. I'd leave the software to others, making sure to support both CarPlay and Android Auto.

ako 3y ago
There's a lot of software in a car besides the entertainment system, you can't leave that to carplay or android. To make good cars, car companies need to be able to write good software.
- vagrantJin 3y ago
  nope nopr nope. Car manufacturers should engineer good cars. Leave the good software engineering to good software engineering firms.
  - spockz 3y ago
    That is what GP is saying. There are two types of software in the car. The entertainment system and the software that drives the engines (ECU), lights, etc, etc. The car company should be good at software engineering to ensure that all software directly related with driving is done properly. And then leave the faster paced entertainment software to other suppliers.
    - ako 3y ago
      Auto pilot, adaptive cruise control, engine start stop controller, brakes, gas, etc, etc. Modern cars can’t drive without software. 100m+ lines of code in a car, 70-100 cpus according to this article: https://medium.com/next-level-german-engineering/porsche-future-of-code-526eb3de3bbe https://medium.com/next-level-german-engineering/porsche-fut...
      - spockz 3y ago
        Exactly! That is the software I want the car engineers to focus on. I do expect most have their firmware provided by Bosch/Siemens or whichever supplier. But Tesla shows how much improvement there is to gain when designing cars from the ground up instead of from parts lists of a vendor.

netsharc 3y ago

Don't they (Apple) want a monthly fee from each install, causing the car manufacturers having to pass the cost on to their customers?

rekoil 3y ago
No, Apple doesn't charge for the existence of CarPlay in a particular car. The manufacturers used to for a while, probably to reclaim their perceived implementation costs and because the industry has worked that way for a long time, but that's not as common anymore, most (besides certain manufacturers) ship it as a default now.

firloop 3y ago

Depending on the specifics, 30% for a deep Apple partnership sounds like an amazing deal

oldpersonintx 3y ago

[dead]

dzhiurgis 3y ago

Almost certain when EV charging apps get embedded in carplay. On a flip side - having one app instead of 10 would be nice…