'About a dozen' Magna engineers working on Apple's electric car, 'Project Titan' - report

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Comments

  • Reply 21 of 31
    Car_guy said:
    This is good news for Apple investors and the presence of the Magna Styer engineers should be seen as evidence that Apple is focusing on the software (and possibly computer hardware) platform vs trying to build an entire car. It is good news for investors because even the most wildly successful auto manufacturers only make a 10-15% margin on their business. Even if Apple ended up with the highest margins in the industry, they would still be a drag on the margins of their existing business. That would only take place after absorbing heavy losses for 5+ years. Tesla is a perfect example. By concentrating on developing a new architecture platform for the future wave of autonomous electric vehicles Apple would be able to earn the much higher margins that a supplier earns along with much lower capital costs. They would be 'outsourcing' the development of their entire vehicle to the existing manufacturers while retaining the expanding market for consumer interaction and services associated with a smart, connected vehicle.
    Magna builds cars on contract for many car makers so don't get your argument AT ALL.
    ration al
  • Reply 22 of 31
    thrangthrang Posts: 1,007member
    Manga is also building certain models of BMW cars it was announced a few days ago - 5 series sedan I think...hmmmm
  • Reply 23 of 31
    foggyhill said:
    Magna is a contract manufacturer... The biggest I think.
    And supposedly Apple is "not" building a car... Yeah, right.
    Apple can truthfully say, "We are not building a car.  (... we're paying Magna to build it for us.)."
  • Reply 24 of 31
    Car_guy said:
    Chazman said:
    My thoughts are is that they realized that the actual car design/construction expertise is not as critical (and more readily available out in the market place when needed) at this stage of the project as the underlying technology they're trying to develop to go into the car being designed/built. I read that the overall workforce working on Project Titan remained the same, being more of a shift between working groups. Sounds like some fine-tuning of a large, long-term project that got blown out of proportion. I am pretty certain Apple intends on selling their own car, most likely contracting out the actual manufacturing like most other car companies already do with a number of their car models - especially final assembly
    No auto manufacturer outsources the final assembly of one of their primary vehicles to another company. It is done with some specialty vehicles and Magna Styer does have a plant in Austria that it uses to build low volume vehicles for a few OEMs. The reason for this is that building a product with over 10,000 parts and thousands of potential variations with extremely high quality is incredibly difficult. Also, the opportunity to continuously improve the assembly process is one of the best ways to improve the profit margin on each vehicle. Lastly, auto assembly plants are massive, extremely expensive operations and a company needs the flexibility of adding popular product to a plant that currently building slower selling product to both increase volume on the popular product and improve the margins of the slow selling one. Can't do that if somebody else is doing the assembly.
    That's incorrect. Magna Steyr has previously manufactured the Mini Countryman and Mini Paceman at their Austria plant, and next year will be building the 5 Series for BMW. They also produce the Mercedes G Class. Those are all final assemblies.
    ration al
  • Reply 25 of 31
    ireland said:
    Self-driving R&D is indefinite.
    That’s absolutely right. There’s no way of knowing when or if it will ever be commercially viable.
  • Reply 26 of 31
    Maybe Apple is going to buy Tesla and don't need that many people for car development in house
    tallest skil
  • Reply 27 of 31
    Nobody really knows what's going on. The most likely scenario is Apple's ultimate goal is a vehicle (they are a product company after all) but if that doesn't pan out they have something to fall back on which would be software they could pitch to existing car companies.
    I'd argue Apple is a product company. Consumer facing, maybe yes. But with iCloud, the App Store (and Apple Music in some respect), I think it's better to think in terms of infrastructure/platform, where the service component is the main revenue driver and determining factor for customer loyalty.
  • Reply 28 of 31
    gatorguygatorguy Posts: 24,176member
    Apple buying McLaren? Could happen. . . 

    EDIT; Oooh, and a link.
    http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/523422ba-7ffd-11e6-8e50-8ec15fb462f4.html
    edited September 2016
  • Reply 29 of 31
    So the McLaren rumor just added a whole new layer to this story.
  • Reply 30 of 31
    gatorguygatorguy Posts: 24,176member
    So the McLaren rumor just added a whole new layer to this story.
    And just as quickly McLaren denies it;

    "BREAKING: McLaren not in discussions w/ Apple about any potential investment, spokesperson for McLaren tells Reuters"
  • Reply 31 of 31
    1st1st Posts: 443member
    atom said:
    Maybe Apple is going to buy Tesla and don't need that many people for car development in house
    or supercar? http://www.marketwatch.com/story/apple-reportedly-in-talks-to-buy-luxury-car-maker-mclaren-2016-09-21

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