Will apples be the last straw when crushing traditional cars?

Fear of the unknown and uncertainty is one of the oldest emotions of human beings. The reason why Car has attracted much attention may be because the technology company's plan to build a car that subverts the feature phone is still mysterious, which makes many traditional car companies feel anxious.

Starting from 20 14, Apple's code name is "Titan" (Project? Since the Titan project was established, the news that Apple built a car has been frequently reported, and the true and false information has been ups and downs in the past six years. Now, many news about Apple's auto business has surfaced in the near future.

65438+ On February 8, local time, Bloomberg reported that Apple's self-driving car department had been handed over to John Gianandrea, director of artificial intelligence responsible for machine learning technologies such as artificial intelligence and Siri. Giannandrea) took over.

Subsequently, Digitimes broke the news that Apple is negotiating with TSMC to produce autonomous driving chips and plans to establish an automobile assembly plant in the United States.

However, after leaving Jobs, can Apple really surprise the market in the automotive field?

"It is no secret that Apple makes cars in the industry. I think their cars may be mass-produced in 2023-2025. " Li Bin, founder of Weilai, revealed the "no secret" of Apple's car-making in August this year.

Apple's connection with cars can even be traced back to 1999, when Ford engineer Steve? Zadsky was recruited into Apple for 20 years.

Before the epoch-making product iPhone was released, Apple had a strong interest in building cars. It is reported that Steve Jobs (Steve? Have you ever considered developing a thin and cheap apple? Car, but finally gave up this plan in 2008 and turned its focus to mobile phones.

With the iPhone becoming Apple's most profitable hardware, Apple once again turned its attention to cars.

At the Apple Global Developers Conference held in June 20 13, Apple officially entered the automotive field and announced "iOS? Are you online? That? Car "plan. In March of 20 14, Carplay was officially released at the Geneva Motor Show. The functions in the iPhone can be mapped to the car center console through USB cable or wifi docking.

At the same time, in 20 14, Apple launched a project called "Titan Project". This is an ambitious project. It is reported that Apple plans to build an unmanned pure electric vehicle, just like the iPhone. As a new species that subverts the automobile industry, many people have named it "iCar".

In September of that year, John, head of Mercedes-Benz North America R&D? Jungwirth was dug into Apple, but the American smartphone giant prefers to dig from Tesla, which was once called "the apple of the automobile industry".

"If you can't keep Tesla, you will jump to Apple." In 20 15, elon musk, CEO of Tesla, laughed and called Apple "Tesla's garbage dump".

It's just that Musk seems to forget that before February 20 15, he dug more than 150 people from Apple, covering design, engineering and legal affairs.

After determining the Titan plan, Apple began to dig the corner of Tesla, so Jamie, the head of Tesla's autonomous driving hardware? Carlson joined Apple in August 2065438+05, former vice president of Tesla Engineering? Chris? Porritt, former director of Tesla chassis engineering? Hubert? Meese and others joined in.

20 18 August Doug left Apple five years ago to join Tesla? Field returned to Cupertino as a special soldier? Project? Group Vice President (SPG), SPG is another name for Apple to build a car.

However, Musk was "happy" with Apple's car-making plan five years ago. In his view, investing in cars conforms to the strategic logic of the company's development and is also a good thing for the whole industry.

But he also reminded the other party that cars are more complicated than smart phones or watches, and you can't just find a supplier like Foxconn and think about building a good car.

At the beginning of the Titan Project, Apple recruited more than 1 000 employees from within, and 1 999 joined Ford Motor Engineer Steve? Zadsky has become Apple's vice president of product design, in (Dan? Riccio) is in charge of the automobile project.

Led by Steve, the Titan team explored many new technologies, including silent electric doors, cabins without steering wheel or throttle, AR-HUD, lidar and spherical wheels.

At that time, Apple executives also met with Magna and other auto parts suppliers and foundries to seek cooperation in the manufacturing field.

However, the initial vision of the project is not clear, and there is also a dispute over the technical route at the top, so the project is not progressing smoothly.

20 16, 1 June, Steve quit the project. Bloomberg said, "This project is very difficult in terms of direction, leadership and technical challenges." Under such circumstances, Apple invited Bob mansfield, a retired former senior vice president of hardware engineering, back in July of that year. Mansfield).

The change of high-level personnel brings about the change of strategic direction, from building cars to autonomous driving and other basic technologies.

20 17 June, Apple CEO Tim Cook (Tim? Cook) talked about Apple's car project in an interview with the media, focusing on the autonomous driving system. "We are focusing on driverless systems. This is a core technology and we think it is very important. We regard it as the mother of all artificial intelligence projects and one of the most difficult AI projects we are working on. "

In 2065438+2009, 65438+ 10, Titan laid off more than 200 people, but an Apple spokesperson said that the company is still committed to the underlying technologies such as autonomous driving.

However, Apple's current autopilot performance is not ideal. At the California Motor Vehicle Administration (DMV, Department? Yes? Motor? According to MPI, Apple ranked at the bottom of 20 18, and improved at 20 19, but did not enter the top ten.

But the strategic shift does not mean giving up making cars. 20 18, Doug? Field's return from Tesla was considered as a hint, and Guo Ming Ti, a well-known analyst, also said in the same year that Apple? Cars will become Apple's star products, or will be listed in 2023-2025.

Li Bin also mentioned this time node this year, and the time node of Digitimes is 2024-2025.

Not only that, Apple's heavy investment in car research and development has to make people think about building cars. In May 2020, Morgan Stanley analyst Katy Huberty (Katy? Huberty) pointed out that this year Apple will invest nearly $654.38+0.9 billion in automobile research and development, which is equivalent to the research and development investment of Volkswagen in 2065.438+09 of nearly $654.38+0.7 billion.

If you only invest in the underlying technologies such as autonomous driving, the capital demand may not be so huge.

Recently, DigiTimes, a media in Taiwan Province Province, broke the latest trend. Apple is jointly developing autopilot chips with TSMC, which is also "Apple? Car "deployment, the media also pointed out that Apple has planned to establish an automobile assembly plant in the United States.

It is worth noting that Hon Hai Group (parent company of Foxconn), which has cooperated with Apple for many years, has just announced its entry into the field of electric vehicles.

On the "Hon Hai Technology Day" in May 438+10 this year, Foxconn released the electric vehicle chassis and software platform "MIH? EV open platform. "

At the same time, since 2020, Hon Hai Group has reached an agreement with Fiat Chrysler (FCA) and Taiwan Province automobile manufacturer Yulong Group to form a joint venture company to cooperate in the field of electric vehicles and car networking.

Perhaps Foxconn is preparing for Apple, a potential "big customer".

Whether in the past, present or future, the automobile industry has always had such a question: "Does the world need a new automobile company and brand?"

Especially at present, the century-old automobile industry is experiencing the impact of electrification, intelligence, networking and enjoyment. Consumers are expecting brand-new car forms and changes in travel modes, and the market is observing the reconstruction of industrial value chain.

Just as Tesla and China's new car-making forces tried to answer this question, the second wave came again, and new brands hatched by local car companies in China, such as Lan Tu and Zhiji, came on stage one after another.

"The wave is coming, and our generation should bend down and enter the competition." On February 9th, 65438, Li Peng, founder of Dou Xian Intelligent and digital executive of Great Wall Motor, challenged new forces in Beijing.

The essence of the former question is how new companies and brands survive. The "new" that everyone pays attention to is actually to answer how to compete with traditional car companies or established startups.

Tesla answered a new round of vertical integration and autonomous driving of the industrial chain, and the user enterprise is Weilai's solution.

"Nobody has me" is certainly the best solution. Even in the era of change, with the influx of dozens or even hundreds of startups, brand-new functions and segmentation are not enough. In the case of limited incremental market, it is a more reliable choice for car companies to compete for the stock market.

Therefore, more "new" car companies and brands are vying for labels, such as long battery life, autonomous driving, intelligence and German quality. What they want to do is actually "better than others" in some ways.

But for Apple, which subverts the feature phone, the expectations of the market and users are definitely not just a "new traditional car manufacturer".

There is no shortage of a car company and a car brand in the automobile industry, but there is no shortage of an alien intruder who breaks the tradition. Subversion is Apple's goal.

"Now the so-called smart car is just an intelligent experience superimposed on a functional car. Just like Nokia uses Saipan system, it is not a real smart car." Li Peng challenges tradition and hopes to create a brand-new mobile space on the basis of intelligent network.

With the platformization of vehicle models and the generalization of parts, can Apple hatch an automobile technology company instead of an automobile manufacturer, break the "OEM" curse, truly realize their definition and design of automobiles, outsource production and go into battle lightly, so as to realize an agile working mode at the software level and better serve users at the ecological level?

Does Apple build iOS and App in the era of mobile Internet? The underlying software and ecosystem such as Store will cooperate with multiple hardware screens such as smart phones, smart watches, computers and tablets. In the future, it is worth looking forward to how Apple can bring the car into this ecology, or reconstruct the ecology based on the car scene, realize active service, seamlessly connect users' lives inside and outside the car, and seize the user's time highland.

The future automobile industry is still chaotic, and people and enterprises who dare to innovate or even subvert are needed to explore unknown areas. Apple has high hopes.

Huawei has also embarked on this path. Apart from "not building a car in three years", the China technology giant has bigger ambitions than Apple. As the object of subversion, the Great Wall is also revolutionizing itself.

After all, tradition is not only inherited, but also broken.

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This article comes from car home, the author of the car manufacturer, and does not represent car home's position.