Following up on yesterday's series of reports about a "top-secret research team" at Apple working on an electric car, Reuters now weighs in with its own source claiming the project involves a self-driving electric car.
Technology giant Apple is learning how to make a self-driving electric car and is talking to experts at carmakers and automotive suppliers, an automotive source familiar with the talks said on Saturday.
The Cupertino, California-based maker of phones, computers and watches is exploring how to make an entire vehicle, not just designing automotive software or individual components, the source said.
"They don't appear to want a lot of help from carmakers," the source, who declined to be named, said.
The source's of claim of self-driving capabilities for the vehicle directly contradicts yesterday's Wall Street Journal report, which specifically stated a self-driving car was not part of the effort. Reuters' source is from the automotive industry rather than at Apple directly, so it is unclear how complete the source's information is.
Apple would not be the only major technology company working on self-driving cars, as Google has been working on such a project for a number of years and has made significant progress in the area. Major car manufacturers are also working hard on technology that would make their cars at least somewhat autonomous.
/article-new/2015/02/google_self_driving_car.jpg?lossy)
Yesterday's report from The Wall Street Journal provided a fair bit of detail on Apple's efforts, noting that Tim Cook approved the project last year. Former Ford engineer and longtime Apple design vice president Steve Zadesky given permission to build a team of up to 1,000 employees largely from within the company to work on the project at a Silicon Valley location separate from Apple's main campus.
Top Rated Comments
(View all)Going to need one of those inflatable people so I can travel in the car pool lane.
Yeah....that's the only reason I have an inflatable person too.....
http://www.teslamotors.com/blog/all-our-patent-are-belong-you
Tesla only makes expensive premium cars and people have assumed they'd make a car with this tech for the masses but Musk has shrugged off this notion, leaving that task to others.
Who? So far, no other car company I know of has taken Musk up on his offer to use this tech. Instead, they have been wasting their time developing their own systems, which, so far, have limited appeal and limited range, and perhaps too high of a price, and none of them have auto-pilot (limited assistance, not fully self-driving).
BTW, all Tesla cars in production include auto-pilot and is capable of software upgrades to make the car fully self-driving.
Apple would not have to develop their own technology, their own patents, for either the electric drive train or the autonomous features.
They may see an opportunity open to them to develop their version of what the world has been waiting for, a sub 20K USD fully electric car with plenty of range for the masses.
The media so far has confused the leaks about them developing a car with the stories about those vans shooting 3D street-view imaging. "Apple is developing a car... a van..."
Those vans are shooting Apple's version of Google's street view.
"Siri, bring me home!"